Linda Pastan is the author of over a dozen poetry collections, including Almost an Elegy (Norton, 2022). Her many awards and honors include a Pushcart Prize, a Dylan Thomas Award, the Di Castagnola Award, the Bess Hokin Prize, the Maurice English Award, the Charity Randall Citation, and the 2003 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. She was a recipient of a Radcliffe College Distinguished Alumnae Award.

From 1991 to 1995, Pastan served as the poet laureate of Maryland, and was among the staff of the Breadloaf Writers’ Conference for twenty years. Pastan died at the age of ninety on January 30, 2023.