Arthur Sze

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Arthur Sze
Sze in 2024
Sze in 2024
Born
New York, New York, U.S.
Occupation
  • Poet
  • translator
  • writer
  • professor
LanguageEnglish, Chinese
EducationMassachusetts Institute of Technology
University of California, Berkeley (BA)
GenrePoetry
Years active1972–present
Notable worksCompass Rose (2014)
Sight Lines (2019)
Notable awardsNational Book Award for Poetry (2019)
SpouseCarol Moldaw
Children2
United States Poet Laureate
In office
October 9, 2025 – present
Preceded byAda Limón

Arthur Sze (English: /ˈziː/; Chinese: 施家彰; pinyin: Shī Jiāzhāng; born 1950) is an American poet, translator, editor, and professor. He is the 25th United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry for 2025-2026.[1] Since 1972, he has published twelve collections of poetry. Sze's books include Into the Hush (Copper Canyon, 2025) and The Glass Constellation: New and Collected Poems (Copper Canyon, 2021), which received a 2024 National Book Foundation Science and Literature Award. His tenth collection, Sight Lines, won the 2019 National Book Award for Poetry, and his ninth collection, Compass Rose (2014), was a finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. Other previous books include The Ginkgo Light (Copper Canyon, 2009), selected for the Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers Association Book Award in Poetry and a PEN Southwest Book Award; Quipu (Copper Canyon, 2005); The Redshifting Web: Poems 1970-1998 (Copper Canyon, 1998), selected for the Balcones Poetry Prize and an Asian American Literary Award; and Archipelago (Copper Canyon, 1995), selected for an American Book Award.

Sze was the first Poet Laureate of Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he resides and is a professor emeritus at the Institute of American Indian Arts.

Early life and education

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Sze is a second-generation Chinese American, born in New York City in 1950.[2] He was raised in Queens and Garden City on Long Island.[3][2] Sze graduated from the Lawrenceville School in 1968. Between 1968 and 1970, Sze attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1970, he transferred to the University of California, Berkeley to pursue poetry.[2] In 1972, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa and received his BA from the University of California, Berkeley, with a self-directed major in poetry.

Career

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His poems have appeared in The American Poetry Review, The Atlantic, Boston Review, Conjunctions, Harper's Magazine,The Kenyon Review, The Nation, The New Republic, The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Paris Review, Poetry, the Virginia Quarterly Review and The Yale Review Online,[4] and have been translated into fifteen languages,including Chinese, Dutch, German, Korean, and Portuguese. He has authored twelve books of poetry, including Into the Hush (Copper Canyon Press, 2025), The Glass Constellation: New and Collected Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2021), Compass Rose (Copper Canyon Press, 2014). This latter volume was a finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.[5]

He has been included in six Best American Poetry anthologies, four Pushcart Prize anthologies, as well as Articulations: The Body and Illness in Poetry (University of Iowa Press, 1994), Premonitions: The Kaya Anthology of New Asian North American Poetry, (Kaya Production, 1995), I Feel a Little Jumpy around You (Simon & Schuster, 1996), What Book!?: Buddhist Poems from Beats to Hiphop (Parallax Press 1998), and American Alphabets (Oberlin College Press, 2006).

In 2012, Sze was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.[6] In 2017, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.

He was the 2023-2024 Mohr Visiting Poet at Stanford University, a Visiting Hurst Professor at Washington University in St. Louis, a Doenges Visiting Artist at Mary Baldwin College, and has conducted residencies at Brown University, Bard College, and Naropa University. He is a professor emeritus at the Institute of American Indian Arts, is the first poet laureate of Santa Fe and has won five grants from the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry.[7]

He became the United States Poet Laureate in 2025. He is the first Asian American United States Poet Laureate.[8][9]

Reception

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The poet Jackson Mac Low has said: "The word 'compassion' is much overused, 'clarity' less so, but Arthur Sze is truly a poet of clarity and compassion." Albuquerque Journal reviewer John Tritica commented that Sze "resides somewhere in the intersection of Taoist contemplation, Zen rock gardens and postmodern experimentation." Critic R.W. French notes that Sze's poems "are complex in thought and perception; in language, however, they have the cool clarity of porcelain. The surface is calm, while the depths are resonant. There is about these poems a sense of inevitability, as though they could not possibly be other than what they are. They move precisely through their patterns like a dancer, guided by the discipline that controls and inspires."[10]

Personal life

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Sze lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico with his wife, Carol Moldaw, and their daughter.[11] Sze also has a son from a previous marriage.[3]

Through his father Morgan, Arthur Sze is a grandson of S.C.Thomas Sze, a younger brother of Alfred Sao-ke Sze.[12][13]

Awards

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Bibliography

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Poetry

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Collections
  • The Willow Wind. Berkeley, California: Rainbow Zenith Press. 1972.
    • The Willow Wind: Poems and Translations from the Chinese (Revised ed.). Santa Fe, New Mexico: Tooth of Time Books. 1981.
  • Two Ravens. Guadalupita, New Mexico: Tooth of Time Publications. 1976.
    • Two Ravens: Poems and Translations from the Chinese (Revised ed.). Santa Fe, New Mexico: Tooth of Time Books. 1984. ISBN 978-0-940510-09-8.
  • Dazzled. Point Reyes Station, California: Floating Island Publications. 1982. ISBN 978-0-912449-07-4.
  • River River. Providence, Rhode Island: Lost Roads Publishers. 1987. ISBN 978-0-918786-35-7.
  • Archipelago. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 1995. ISBN 9781556591006.
  • The Redshifting Web: Poems 1970–1998. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 1998. ISBN 9781556590887.
  • Quipu. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 2005. ISBN 9781556592263.
  • The Ginkgo Light. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 2009. ISBN 9781556592997.
  • Compass Rose. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 2014. ISBN 9781556594670.
  • Sight Lines. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 2019. ISBN 978-1-55659-559-2.
  • Starlight Behind Daylight. Afton, Virginia: St Brigid Press. 2020.[14]
  • The Glass Constellation: New and Collected Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2021)
  • The White Orchard: Selected Interviews, Essays, and Poems (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2025)
  • Into the Hush (Copper Canyon Press, 2025)
Translations
  • The Silk Dragon: Translations of Chinese Poetry. Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press. 2001. ISBN 978-1-55659-153-2.
  • The Silk Dragon II: Translations of Chinese Poetry (Copper Canyon Press, 2024)
In anthology

As editor

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References

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  1. ^ "Library of Congress Names Arthur Sze the Nation's 25th U.S. Poet Laureate". Library of Congress - News and Content for Media. Retrieved 2025-12-10.
  2. ^ a b c Guiyou Huang (2002). Asian-American Poets: A Bio-bibliographical Critical Sourcebook. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 293. ISBN 978-0-313-31809-2.
  3. ^ a b Levin, Jennifer (January 10, 2020). "Perspectives converge: National Book Award winner Arthur Sze". The Santa Fe New Mexican. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
  4. ^ Virginia Quarterly Review Archived 2008-12-01 at the Wayback Machine, vqronline.org; accessed 16 June 2015.
  5. ^ "2015 Pulitzer Prizes". www.pulitzer.org. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  6. ^ Sze, Arthur (4 February 2014). "Arthur Sze". Arthur Sze. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  7. ^ "Arthur Sze". The Poetry Foundation. 2025-10-01. Retrieved 2025-10-12.
  8. ^ op de Beeck, Nathalie. "Arthur Sze Named U.S. Poet Laureate". PublishersWeekly.com.
  9. ^ Harris, Elizabeth A. (2025-09-15). "Arthur Sze Will Be the Next U.S. Poet Laureate". The New York Times. Retrieved 2025-10-12.
  10. ^ R.W. French. "Arthur Sze: "The Redshifting Web: Poems 1970-1998"". Archived from the original on April 18, 2010. Retrieved June 16, 2015.
  11. ^ Guiyou Huang (2002). Asian-American Poets: A Bio-bibliographical Critical Sourcebook. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 293. ISBN 978-0-313-31809-2.
  12. ^ ""Morgan Sze Obituary"". Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram. 27 March 2015. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  13. ^ Brand, David (7 November 2001). "Builder of Chinese railroads, 'Tommy' Sze, is remembered through endowment to Cornell school of mechanical engineering". Cornell Chronicle. Retrieved 17 September 2025.
  14. ^ "Starlight Behind Daylight ~ by Arthur Sze". St Brigid Press. Retrieved November 18, 2020.
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