Consultants in Poetry and Poets Laureate Consultants in Poetry and their terms of service are listed below:

Joseph Auslander (1937-41)
Allen Tate (1943-44)
Robert Penn Warren (1944-45)
Louise Bogan (1945-46)
Karl Shapiro (1946-47)
Robert Lowell (1947-48)
Leonie Adams (1948-49)
Elizabeth Bishop (1949-50)
Conrad Aiken (1950-52, first to serve two terms)
William Carlos Williams (appointed in 1952 but did not serve)
Randall Jarrell (1956-58)
Robert Frost (1958-59)
Richard Eberhart (1959-61)
Louis Untermeyer (1961-63)
Howard Nemerov (1963-64)
Reed Whittemore (1964-65)
Stephen Spender (1965-66)
James Dickey (1966-68)
William Jay Smith (1968-70)
William Stafford (1970-71)
Josephine Jacobsen (1971-73)
Daniel Hoffman (1973-74)
Stanley Kunitz (1974-76)
Robert Hayden (1976-78)
William Meredith (1978-80)
Maxine Kumin (1981-82)
Anthony Hecht (1982-84)
Robert Fitzgerald (1984-85, appointed and served in a health-limited capacity; did not come to the Library)
Reed Whittemore (1984-85 Interim Consultant in Poetry)
Gwendolyn Brooks (1985-86)
Robert Penn Warren (1986-87, first to be designated Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry)
Richard Wilbur (1987-88)
Howard Nemerov (1988-90)
Mark Strand (1990-91)
Joseph Brodsky (1991-92)
Mona Van Duyn (1992-93)
Rita Dove (1993-95)
Robert Hass (1995-97)
Robert Pinsky (1997-2000)
Stanley Kunitz (2000-2001)

The poetry and literature reading series at the Library of Congress is the oldest in the Washington area, and among the oldest in the United States. This annual series of public poetry and fiction readings, lectures, symposia and occasional dramatic performances began in the 1940s and has been almost exclusively supported since 1951 by a gift from the late Gertrude Clarke Whittall, who wanted to bring the appreciation of good literature to a larger audience. The Poetry and Literature Center administers the series and is the home of the Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry, a position that has existed since 1936, when the late Archer M. Huntington endowed the Chair of Poetry at the Library of Congress. Since then, many of the nation’s most eminent poets have served as Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress and, after the passage of Public Law 99-194 (December 20, 1985), as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry. The Poet Laureate suggests authors to read in the literary series, plans other special literary events during the reading season, and usually introduces the programs

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