Monument, Trethewey's first retrospective, draws together verse that delineates the stories of working class African American women, a mixed-race prostitute, one of the first black Civil War regiments, mestizo and mulatto figures in Casta paintings, Gulf coast victims of Katrina. Through the collection, inlaid and inextricable, winds the poet's own family history of trauma and loss, resilience and love. In this setting, each section, each poem drawn from an "opus of classics both elegant and necessary,"* weaves and interlocks with those that come before and those that follow. As a whole, Monument casts new light on the trauma of our national wounds, our shared history. This is a poet's remarkable labor to source evidence, persistence, and strength from the past in order to change the very foundation of the vocabulary we use to speak about race, gender, and our collective future.

Through elegiac verse that honors her mother and tells of her own fraught childhood, Natasha Trethewey confronts the racial legacy of her native Deep South -- where one of the first black regiments, the Louisiana Native Guards, was called into service during the Civil War. Trethewey's resonant and beguiling collection is a haunting conversation between personal experience and national history.

At age nineteen, Natasha Trethewey had her world turned upside down when her former stepfather shot and killed her mother.

Heartbreakingly clear-eyed and tender, Memorial Drive is a daughter's act of love - and an unflinching excavation of the wounds that never heal. For as Trethewey tells her story, and reclaims her mother's, she lays bare the indelible scars of slavery and racism on the soul of a troubled nation.

Praise for earlier editions: "Unlike novelists and bad-boy memoirists, emerging poets are unlikely to sprawl on Oprah's couch, date starlets, or rouse bidding wars. With an alert ear for new voices, this anthology offers a different kind of validation: that of being well heard. The result is a vibrant smorgasbord.... [ "Best New Poets"] bears evidence of the insistent inquiries of self and the world that drive poetry."-- "Foreword" "[One] comes to realize that the adjectives 'new' and 'emerging' are mere technicalities in this instance. Although none of the poets included here have published a full-length book of poetry, many are MFA students or graduates, and chapbook authors, and most have already seen some of their poems published in the most renowned and exclusive journals in North America.... The result is a remarkably diverse mix of poems."-- "BookPleasures""It's a nervy thing for an anthology to label itself "Best New Poets," but once again this collection lives up to its name. It's a rich and readable selection, reflecting no party-line aesthetic, and attesting to the formidable promise of the emerging generation."--David WojahnIn just three years "Best New Poets" has established itself as a crucial venue for rising poets and a valuable resource for poetry lovers. The only publication of its kind, this annual anthology is made up exclusively of work by writers who have not yet published a full-length book. The poems included in this eclectic sampling represent the best from the many that have been nominated by the country's top literary magazines and writing programs, as well as some two thousand additional poems submitted through an open online competition. The work of thefifty writers represented here provides the best perspective available on the continuing vitality of poetry as it's being practiced today.

ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S BEST BOOKS OF 2020 WINNER OF THE ANISFIELD-WOLF BOOK AWARD SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2021 CARNEGIE MEDAL IN NON-FICTION 'This will be read for many, many years to come as a classic not just of the memoir genre but of contemporary writing' Simon Schama 'The work of a poet. A great poet' Financial Times 'A must-read classic' Mary Karr 'Trethewey writes elegantly, trenchantly, intimately as well about the fraught history of the south and what it means live at the intersection of America's struggle between blackness and whiteness. And what, in our troubled republic, is a subject more evergreen?' Mitchell S. Jackson Natasha Trethewey was born in Mississippi in the 60s to a black mother and a white father. When she was six, Natasha's parents divorced, and she and her mother moved to Atlanta. There, her mother met the man who would become her second husband, and Natasha's stepfather. While she was still a child, Natasha decided that she would not tell her mother about what her stepfather did when she was not there: the quiet bullying and control, the games of cat and mouse. Her mother kept her own secrets, secrets that grew harder to hide as Natasha came of age. When Natasha was nineteen and away at college, her stepfather shot her mother dead on the driveway outside their home. With penetrating insight and a searing voice that moves from the wrenching to the elegiac, Memorial Drive is a compelling and searching look at a shared human experience of sudden loss and absence, and a piercing glimpse at the enduring ripple effects of white racism and domestic abuse. Luminous, urgent, and visceral, it cements Trethewey's position as one of the most important voices in America today.

Selected as a "2003 Notable Book" by the American Library Association
In the early 1900s, E.J. Bellocq photographed prostitutes in the red-light district of New Orleans. His remarkable, candid photos inspired Natasha Trethewey to imagine the life of Ophelia, the subject of her stunning second collection of poems. With elegant precision, Ophelia tells of her life on display: her white father whose approval she earns by standing very still; the brothel Madame who tells her to act like a statue while the gentlemen callers choose; and finally the camera, which not only captures her body, but also offers a glimpse into her soul.

Volume 3 of Double Exposure highlights NMAAHC's rich collection of photographs of African American women, some of whom are cultural icons. This volume demonstrates the dignity, joy, heartbreak, commitment, and sacrifice of women of all ages and backgrounds, with photographs by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Beverly Conley, Robert Galbraith, Ernest C. Withers, Wayne F. Miller, P.H. Polk, Joe Schwartz, and Milton Williams. Aligned to Common Core Standards Natasha Trethewey was the United States Poet Laureate 2012-2013. She has written an original essay and reprinted two poems for this title. Kinshasha Holman Conwill is the deputy director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Natasha Trethewey was born in Mississippi in the 60s to a black mother and a white father. When she was six, Natasha's parents divorced, and she and her mother moved to Atlanta. There, her mother met the man who would become her second husband, and Natasha's stepfather. While she was still a child, Natasha decided that she would not tell her mother about what her stepfather did when she was not there: the quiet bullying and control, the games of cat and mouse. Her mother kept her own secrets, secrets that grew harder to hide as Natasha came of age. When Natasha was nineteen and away at college, her stepfather shot her mother dead on the driveway outside their home. With penetrating insight and a searing voice that moves from the wrenching to the elegiac, Memorial Drive is a compelling and searching look at a shared human experience of sudden loss and absence, and a piercing glimpse at the enduring ripple effects of white racism and domestic abuse. Luminous, urgent, and visceral, it cements Trethewey's position as one of the most important voices in America today.

Yes, there is barbecue, but that's just one course of the meal. With Vinegar and Char the Southern Foodways Alliance celebrates twenty years of symposia by offering a collection of poems that are by turns as sophisticated and complex, as vivid and funny, and as buoyant and poignant as any SFA gathering. The roster of contributors includes Natasha Trethewey, Robert Morgan, Atsuro Riley, Adrienne Su, Richard Blanco, Ed Madden, Nikky Finney, Frank X Walker, Sheryl St. Germain, Molly McCully Brown, and forty-five more. These poets represent past, current, and future conversations about what it means to be southern. Throughout the anthology, region is layered with race, class, sexuality, and other shaping identities. With an introduction by Sandra Beasley, a thought-provoking foreword by W. Ralph Eubanks, and luminous original artwork by Julie Sola, this collection is an ideal gift. Meant to be savored slowly or devoured at once, these pages are a perfect way to spend the hour before supper, with a glass of iced tea?or the hour after, with a pour of bourbon?and a fitting celebration of the SFA's focus and community.

Beyond Katrina is poet Natasha Trethewey's very personal profile of her natal Mississippi Gulf Coast and of the people there whose lives were forever changed by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Trethewey's attempt to understand and document the damage to Gulfportstarted as a series of lectures at the University of Virginia that were subsequently published as essays in the Virginia Quarterly Review. For Beyond Katrina, Trethewey expanded this work into a narrative that incorporates personal letters, poems, and photographs, offering a moving meditation on the love she holds for her childhood home. In this new edition, Trethewey looks back on the ten years that have passed since Katrina in a new epilogue, outlining progress that has been made and the challenges that still exist.

Eudora Welty's Photographs, originally published in 1989, serves as the definitive book of the critically acclaimed writer's photographs. Her camera's viewfinder captured deep compassion and her artist's sensibilities. Photographs is a deeply felt documentation of 1930s Mississippi taken by a keenly observant photographer who showed the human side of her subjects. Also included in the book are pictures from Welty's travels to New York, New Orleans, South Carolina, Mexico, and Europe in the 1930s, '40s, and '50s. The photographs in this edition are new digital scans of Welty's original negatives and authentic prints, restoring the images to their original glory. It also features sixteen additional images, several of which were selected by Welty for her 1936 photography exhibit in New York City and have never before been reproduced for publication, along with a resonant, new foreword by Pulitzer Prize–winning writer and Mississippi native Natasha Trethewey.