Writer Rita Dove was the youngest person and the first African American to be appointed

Poet Laureate Consultant by the Library of Congress. She has also won the Pulitzer for
her book Thomas and Beulah.

IN THESE GROUPS

FAMOUS PEOPLE BORN IN OHIO

FAMOUS PEOPLE NAMED DOVE

FAMOUS PEOPLE IN FICTION & POETRY

FAMOUS PEOPLE BORN IN 1952

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QUOTES
We tend to be so bombarded with information, and we move so quickly, that there's a
tendency to treat everything on the surface level and process things quickly. That is
antithetical to the kind of openness and perception you have to have to be receptive to
poetry.
Rita Dove

Synopsis
Born on August 28, 1952 in Akron, Ohio, African-American poet Rita Dove loved poetry and
music from a young age. She was an exceptional student and was invited to the White House as a
Presidential Scholar out of high school. She studied in Germany on a Fulbright Scholarship, later
teaching creative writing at Arizona State University. She has won numerous awards for her
work, including a 1987 Pulitzer Prize for the book of poetry Thomas and Beulah. Other books
from Dove include Mother Love and Sonata Mulattica.

Education and Personal Life

Born in Akron, Ohio on August 28, 1952, Rita Dove developed a love for learning and literature
at an early age in a household that encouraged reading. She was honored as a Presidential
Scholar, being ranked as one of the top 100 high school students in the nation, and as a National
Merit Scholar attended Ohios Miami University, graduating in 1973 summa cum laude. She
subsequently studied abroad in Germany before returning to the states and earning her M.F.A.
from the University of Iowa.
She met fellow writer Fred Viebahn, also of Germany, in the mid-1970s while he was studying at
the Univ. of Iowa. The two wed in 1979 and went on to have a daughter, Aviva.

Esteemed Writer
Dove established a fine career in academia, eventually teaching at the University of Virginia and
becoming an esteemed, award-winning poet. She published chapbooks early in her career and
made her mark with collections like The Yellow House on the
Corner (1980) and Museum (1983). Dove is known not only for the layered eloquence of her
language and ideas but also for portraying portions of the black experience in America, both on a
personal and collective front.
In 1986 she published Thomas and Beulah, a semi-autobiographical look at the lives of her
grandparents that won the poetry Pulitzer Prize the following year. Other books include Grace
Notes (1989) and Mother Love (1995), while her 1999 work On the Bus With Rosa Parks was
hailed as a Notable Book of the Year by The New York Times.

Appointed Poet Laureate

In May of 1993, Dove was named the poet laureate of the United States, a post held previously
by bards like Robert Penn Warren and Joseph Brodsky. She was the first African American
appointed to the position as well as the first woman and the youngest, at 41 years old. (AfricanAmerican writersRobert Hayden and Gwendolyn Brooks were both Library of Congress
Consultants in Poetry, which was replaced by the Poet Laureate Consultant title in 1985.)
In 1996, after her laureate post had ended, Dove received the National Humanities Medal from
President Bill Clinton, the same year in which she received the Heinz Award in the Arts and
Humanities.

Editor and Lyricist

In addition to her poetry, Dove has penned prose, as seen with the short-story collection Fifth
Sunday (1985), the novel Through the Ivory Gate (1992) and the essay collection The Poets
World (1995). She has also written the play The Darker Face of the Earth (1994), and
collaborated as a lyricist with a variety of composers.
Dove has served as an editor as well, helming The Best American Poetry 2000 and
2011s Penguin Anthology of 20th Century American Poetry; the latter was released the same
year as Doves critically acclaimed book-length poem Sonatta Mulattica, about biracial classical
violinist George Polgreen Bridgetower.