Event commemorates UA Poetry Center's 40th anniversary

The UA Poetry Center's decades-old tradition of bringing top poets to Tucson continues tonight as two-time United States Poet Laureate Robert Hass reads in celebration of the Center's 40th anniversary.

Hass, an English professor at the University of California Berkeley, served as poet laureate from 1995 to 1997 and is widely regarded as one of the nation's finest living poets.

"I think he is one of the great poets of our time," said Poetry Center director Jim Paul.

Hass is the author of four books of poetry and a book of essays, and has also translated the works of several major foreign poets. His appointment as poet laureate is one of many honors and awards Hass has received, including the Yale Series of Younger Poets title in 1973 and two National Book Critics Circle Awards.