U.S. Poet Laureate, 2015-2017
Juan Felipe Herrera was born in Fowler, California, in 1948. He is the author of 30 books of poetry, novels for young adults, and collections for children, including Half the World in Light: New and Selected Poems (2008), winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and the International Latino Book Award. Herrera has also published 11 books of young adult and children’s books, including most recently Portraits of Hispanic American Heroes (2014), a picture book showcasing inspiring Hispanic and Latino Americans. His honors include fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, two Latino Hall of Fame Poetry Awards, a PEN / Beyond Margins Award, a PEN USA National Poetry Award, a PEN Oakland / Josephine Miles Award, two Américas Awards, two Pura Belpré Author Honor Awards, the Independent Publisher Book Award, and the Ezra Jack Keats Award. Elected a Chancellor for the Academy of American Poets in 2011, Herrera served as the Poet Laureate of California from 2012-2015. In 2016, he was awarded the Robert Kirsch Award for lifetime achievement at the 36th L.A. Times Book Prizes.
Herrera has served as the chair of the Chicano and Latin American Studies Department at California State University Fresno and held the Tomás Rivera Endowed Chair in the Creative Writing Department at the University of California, Riverside, where he taught until retiring in 2015. He lives in Fresno, CA.
Poet Laureate Projects
- “La Casa de Colores”
- “The Technicolor Adventures of Catalina Neon”
- “Wordstreet Champions and Brave Builders of the Dream”
Selected Works at the Library of Congress
Events at the Library of Congress
Videos from the Library of Congress
- 2005 Americas Awards for Children's and Young Adult Literature
- Juan Felipe Herrera: 2013 National Book Festival
- Juan Felipe Herrera 2015 National Book Festival PSA (English)
- Juan Felipe Herrera 2015 National Book Festival PSA (Spanish)
- Juan Felipe Herrera: 2015 National Book Festival
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera on the Huexotzinco Codex
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera Discusses the WPA California Folk Music Project Collection
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera Discusses Literatura de Cordel
- Juan Felipe Herrera Discusses Alan Lomax & Woody Guthrie
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera: More Prints & Photographs
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera on Prints & Photographs
- 21st Poet Laureate Inaugural Reading: Juan Felipe Herrera
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera on the Hispanic Law Collection
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera Discusses Sylvester & Orphanos Publishers Archives
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera on Don Quixote
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera on Rare Cuban Treasures
- Celebrating "One Life: Dolores Huerta"
- Witter Bynner Fellowship Reading: Allison Hedge Coke
- Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera Closes His Term
- Juan Felipe Herrera Celebrates DIA
- Asamblea de Artistas Revolucionarios de Oaxaca: Juan Felipe Herrera's "Automatika" Series
- Poem for the Librarian
- Bob Adelman: Photographer, Artist, Witness to History
- Juan Felipe Herrera & Tom Sleigh
- Speak the People / the Spark / el Poema: Fresno State Chamber Singers