Quote of the Day (Poet Tracy K. Smith, on Whether Books ‘Serve a Moral Function’)

“It’s a mistake to expect literature to teach us how to live our lives. But the practice of reading does, to my mind, serve a moral function. On its most basic level, literature instills in us the capacity to be rapt and beholden to a stranger’s voice, to do everything possible to hear and heed that voice in such a way that it is permitted to illuminate something. Sometimes what it illuminates are facets of ourselves — even our former or future selves. This to me feels like a very vital moral exercise.”—Former U.S. poet laureate Tracy K. Smith, “By the Book: Tracy K. Smith,” The New York Times Book Review, Nov. 19, 2023

The image accompanying this post was derived from a photo of Tracy K. Smith with Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden and National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman, taken Sept. 25, 2017, by the Library of Congress.