ABOUT ROSS
Ross Gay is interested in joy.
Ross Gay wants to understand joy.
Ross Gay is curious about joy.
Ross Gay studies joy.
Something like that.
~
Ross Gay is the author of four books of poetry: Against Which; Bringing the Shovel Down; Be Holding; and Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. In addition to his poetry, Ross has released a few collections of essays—The Book of Delights was released in 2019; Inciting Joy was released in 2022; and The Book of (More) Delights was released in 2023. His new book, Why I Garden, will be released in April of 2027.
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Bio
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High Resolution Book Covers
Photographs
Click on each photo for a link to a high resolution version. All photos by Natasha Komoda.
INTERVIEWS & CONVERSATIONS
Listen
Interview with The Writing Life (2025)
Interview with Earth Eats (May 2025)
Interview with Iowa Public Radio, 04/2025
Episode 11: Ross Gay & Margaret Renkl, The Wild Story Podcast (04/2024)
Volume 2, Number 124 - Ross Gay, The Musical Innertube (01/2024)
Delight and Joy Are Survival Mechanisms and Acts of Resistance, Ten Percent Happier (09/2023)
Episode 339: Ross Gay, Kirkus Reviews Podcast (09/2023)
Podcast Interview, Margaret Roach’s A Way to Garden
Ep. 83: Ross Gay, Faculty Series – Indiana University Bloomington
Finding ‘(More) Delights’ with Ross Gay, KQED Forum (09/2023)
Poet and essayist Ross Gay on why you don’t need to be an optimist to incite joy, Claremont McKenna’s The Student Life (09/2023)
Four years after the release of his runaway bestseller “The Book of Delights,” Gay is still finding joy in the world around him, Shondaland (09/2023)
More Delights with Ross Gay, Black Joy, reckon (09/2023)
Ross Gay on Finding Everyday Delight, WHYY (09/2023)
Ross Gay’s The Book of (More) Delights, Los Angeles Review of Books Radio Hour (09/2023)
Ross Gay on How We Can Change, Sentence By Sentence, WFIU: Inner States (09/2023)
Conversation with Montse Andrée Carty, Musings with the Artist (09/2023)
Stitches and everyday joy , Iowa Public Radio (09/2023)
The language of grief, with writers Ross Gay and Chloe Honum, KCRW Life Examined (09/2023)
Ross Gay on inciting joy while dining with sorrow, NPR (02/2023)
Inviting Sorrow in for Tea, Tricycle Magazine podcast (04/2023)
How to Incite Joy with Ross Gay, The One You Feed podcast (04/2023)
Joy, with Ross Gay, Fireside podcast (04/2023)
“That Notebook Might Be Magic”: A Conversation With Ross Gay, On The Same Page podcast (03/2023)
Exploring the Transformative Power of Writing and Vulnerability with Ross Gay, Think Unbroken podcast (03/2023)
Ross Gay on Inciting Joy Inner States (10/2022)
"GERMINATE", The Clever Creature Podcast (08/2021)
"Words to Set You Free," CodeSwitch, NPR (07/2021)
The Sewanee Review podcast (05/2021)
Ross Gay on "Dilate Your Heart," WNYC (04/2021)
"Poet Ross Gay focuses on everyday delights," Oregon Public Broadcasting (04/2021)
Interview with The Creative Independent (02/2021)
"2021 Is A Mess. Here’s How To Stay Positive," WBEZ's Nerdette Podcast (01/2021)
Between The Covers (01/ 2021)
"The Growing Edge Podcast" (11/2020)
"The Book of Delights," Living on Earth (02/2020)
"Ep. 73: Ross Gay — Attending to the Love That Surrounds Us," Think, Act, Be Podcast (01/2020)
This American Life, NPR (01/2020)
Poets & Writers Podcast (12/2019)
"365 Days Of Delight: A Poet's Guide To Finding Joy," Wisconsin Public Radio (10/2019)
"Tending Joy and Practicing Delight," On Being (07/2019)
"Episode 39: Delight in the Unexpected," Science of Happiness podcast, Greater Good Magazine (04/2019)
"Fully Booked" podcast with Kirkus Reviews (04/2019)
"Episode 25," Commonplace Interview (04/2019)
"Poet Ross Gay finds delight even in difficult times," Minnesota Public Radio (03/2019)
NPR All Things Considered (02/2019)
Interview with Superstition Review (11/2017)
Words on a Wire Interview with Ross Gay (07/2017)
Interview with Kaveh Akbar for DiveDapper (11/2015)
"Poet and Professor Ross Gay," Profiles (02/2014)
"Ross Gay and Aimee Nezhukumatathil Discuss Gardens and Collaborative Poetry," Orion Magazine (02/2014)
"Natural Poetry," Living on Earth (06/2010)
Read
Ross Gay Stays Connected With Internet Reprieves and Foraged Apples to Share, Vanity Fair (10/2023)
Ross Gay Answers the Orion Questionnaire, Orion Magazine
The Framework of These Delights: 5 Questions with Ross Gay Author of The Book of (More) Delights, Barnes & Noble Reads (09/2023)
Another Dose of Delight From a Writer Who Finds Wonder in His Backyard, New York Times (09/2023)
Limitless Delights, Tricycle Magazine (12/2023)
Beholding Black Life: A Conversation with Ross Gay, Frank Guridy, & Deborah Paredez (06/2022)
Interview with Nadia Colburn (12/2021)
Interview with Brooklyn Poets (11/2021)
"An Interview with Ross Gay," Sunlight Press (11/2020)
Delightful Observation: An Interview With Ross Gay, Writers Digest (6/2020)
Interview with Shelf Awareness (02/2019)
An interview with On The Record, WYPR (02/2019)
Interview with The Rumpus (02/2019)
Interview with The Writer Mag (06/2019)
"The Terrible and the Beautiful," Los Angeles Review of Books (11/2016)
"A Garden of Gratitude," The Christian Century (07/2016)
"Theorizing Delight: An Interview with Ross Gay," The Common (05/2019)
"Poet Ross Gay is on a roll: He talks gardens and gratitude," Los Angeles Times (02/2016)
"Dinnerview: Ross Gay," Entropy (12/2015)
"Wild Love: Ross Gay on the connections between gardening and poetry," The Poetry Foundation (10/2015)
The PEN Ten with Ross Gay, Interview with Nicole Sealy (07/2015)
Interview with The Rumpus (03/2015)
Interview with Barely South Review (Winter, 2015)
Interview with Todd Davis, Interdisciplinary Literary Studies (2013)
Interview with Indiana University (2013)
Interview with Brian Brodeur at How a Poem Happens (03/2011)