Hayden Carruth was born in Waterbury, CT in 1921, and educated at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Chicago. He has published more than thirty books, chiefly poetry, but also novels and essays on music, particularly the blues and jazz. He is a chronicler of rural culture and a politically active radical voice. Among his numerous prizes are the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Lenore Marshall Award, the Paterson Poetry Prize, the Whiting Award, the Ruth Lilly Prize, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship.