Elisa Gabbert (born 1979)[1] is an American writer, poet and essayist. She is the author of numerous books and is currently a New York Times poetry columnist.
Gabbert attended Rice University where she studied linguistics and cognitive science. She also earned an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College.[2] Since March 2020, Gabbert has been The New York Times poetry columnist, succeeding David Orr.[3]
During her career, she was based in Denver, Colorado[3] and now lives in Providence, Rhode Island[citation needed], with her husband, the writer John Cotter.[citation needed]
Currently, Gabbert is the author of six books, including two essay collections and four poetry collections.
As of 2021, Gabbert has published 2 collections of essays: The Word Pretty in 2018, and The Unreality of Memory in 2020.
Her debut essay collection The Word Pretty[4][5] was followed by the much acclaimed collection The Unreality of Memory (2020),[6][7][8][9][10] which engages the history of catastrophes to consider how people perceive themselves.[11]
Gabbert is the author of four poetry collections, including The French Exit (2011)[12][13] and L'Heure Bleue, or the Judy Poems (2016);[14] the latter imagines the perspective of Judy, one of the characters in Wallace Shawn’s play The Designated Mourner.
Gabbert’s book The Self Unstable (2013) is a hybrid collection of prose and poetry.[15][16][17] In The New Yorker’s year-end review, Teju Cole named The Self Unstable one of the best books of 2013.[18]
Gabbert’s book of poetry, Normal Distance, was published by Soft Skull Press in 2022.[19]