Timothy Donnelly’s most recent book, Chariot, was published in 2023 by Wave Books. His previous books include The Problem of the Many, winner of the inaugural Big Other Poetry Prize and The Cloud Corporation, winner of the 2012 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. His poems have been widely translated and anthologized, and have appeared in such periodicals as American Poetry Review, Conjunctions, Harper’s, The Kenyon Review, The Nation, The New Republic, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Poetry, and elsewhere, as well as in the Best American Poetry and Pushcart Prize anthologies. Donnelly is a recipient of Columbia University’s Distinguished Faculty and Faculty Mentoring Awards, the Poetry Society of America’s Alice Fay di Castagnola Award, and The Paris Review’s Bernard F. Connors Prize, as well as fellowships and residencies from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and the New York State’s Writers Institute. He teaches in the Writing Program of Columbia University School of the Arts and lives in Brooklyn with his family. 

About the Poets in the Conversation Room Series

In partnership with Annapolis Home Magazine, St. John’s College presents a series called Poets in the Conversation Room hosted by renowned poet, author, playwright, and tenth Maryland Poet Laureate Grace Cavalieri.

“Annapolis needs poetry,” says Kymberly Taylor, poet and Editor-In-Chief of Annapolis Home Magazine. “It needs this incredible art form that helps us feel things beyond what we hear and read online, on television, and in the news.”

“There couldn’t be a more fitting partnership for the college than Poets in the Conversation Room,” says St. John’s College President Nora Demleitner. “At the college, students spend four years reading and discussing great classical poets – from Homer to Baudelaire. This is a wonderful opportunity to expose them to more modern poetry while also welcoming and engaging the Annapolis community.”

Poetry readings will are held the first Saturday of every month at 2 p.m. in the St. John’s College Conversation Room, located in Mellon Hall, 60 College Ave, Annapolis, MD 21401. Readings are 40 minutes followed by a 20-minute question period. The poetry series is free and open to the public. Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis. Works by the featured poets will be on display at the St. John’s College Greenfield Library and available to purchase at the St. John’s College Bookstore.

“I think it’s going to create a tremendous audience because it’s also entertaining,” says Cavalieri. “Poetry speaks to how we feel and how it is to be alive in this world—and who does not want to hear that?”