Ross Gay

Ross Gay is the New York Times bestselling author of the essay collections The Book of Delights and Inciting Joy and four books of poetry. His Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and was a finalist for the National Book Award; and Be Holding won the 2021 PEN America Jean Stein Book Award. His latest book of essays is 2023’s The Book of (More) Delights.

Gay is a founding board member of the Bloomington Community Orchard, a non-profit, free-fruit-for-all food justice and joy project and has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, and the Guggenheim Foundation. He is the Ruth Lilly Professor of English at Indiana University.