Literature
Tyehimba Jess
born 1965 · poet
Detroit-born poet whose Olio, a daring book about Black musicians and performers before the Harlem Renaissance, won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.
- Born
Detroit, Michigan- Detroit years
- 1965–1980s
- Field
- Literature
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Jess was born in Detroit in 1965 and grew up in the city, where his father worked for the city's Department of Health and later became first vice president of the Detroit branch of the NAACP. The music and civil-rights culture of that household runs through his work. After studying at the University of Chicago and New York University, he became known for inventive books built around Black musical history: leadbelly (2005), a National Poetry Series winner about the blues singer, and Olio (2016), which uses sonnets, fold-out pages and 'syncopated' poems that can be read in several directions to give voice to largely forgotten Black performers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Olio won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.
Highlights
- Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (2017) for Olio
- leadbelly (2005), a National Poetry Series selection
- Son of a Detroit NAACP leader
- Known for inventive 'syncopated' poetic forms