![](https://www.texasbookfestival.org/wp-content/uploads/gravity_forms/63-aaf046e5e02b1ccb23521abfc41b364d/2022/07/Ross-Gay-c-Natasha-Komoda_CROP_1-scaled-e1658168531298-300x300.jpg)
Ross Gay
Ross Gay is the New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Delights: Essays and four books of poetry. His Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude won the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 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. He is a founding board member of the Bloomington Community Orchard, a nonprofit, free-fruit-for-all food justice and joy project. Gay has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, and the Guggenheim Foundation. He teaches at Indiana University.