Elizabeth Alexander is an American poet, essayist, and playwright who taught poetry and chaired the African American studies department for 15 years as a professor at Yale University. Alexander joined the faculty of Columbia University in 2016 as the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor in the Humanities in the Department of English and Comparative Literature. She became the president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in 2018.
Born in Harlem, New York, Alexander grew up in Washington, D.C. She received a BA from Yale University, an MA from Boston University, and a PhD in English from the University of Pennsylvania.
Her collections of poetry include Crave Radiance: New and Selected Poems 1990-2010 (Graywolf Press, 2010); American Sublime (Graywolf Press, 2005), which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; Antebellum Dream Book (Graywolf Press, 2001); Body of Life (Tia Chucha Press, 1996); and The Venus Hottentot (University Press of Virginia, 1990). Her memoir, The Light of the World (Grand Central Publishing, 2015), was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
