Kwame Alexander’s mission is simple—to change the world, one word at a time. But as this Emmy Award-winning producer and author of 40 books—many of which are No. 1 New York Times bestsellers—will tell you, simple doesn’t always mean easy. Alexander’s tireless work as an educator and literary ambassador on multiple continents has underscored the impact of his writing. “I have visited over 2,000 schools in the past two years,” he says.

This includes those schools on Nantucket in partnership with the Nantucket Book Foundation’s Visiting Authors program. In 2023, Alexander was “hope No. 1” for Rebecca Hickman, the Cyrus Peirce Middle School Library teacher, and others involved in the program. “To say we were over the moon to have Newbery Award winner and New York Times bestselling author Kwame Alexander visit our schools last spring is an understatement! The sheer number of awards his books have received, and the fact that keeping his titles on the library shelves is nearly impossible to this day, is indicative of his popularity among tweens and teens,” she raves.

This year, Alexander is returning to the island for the Nantucket Book Festival, during which he will speak about his 2023 memoir Why Fathers Cry at Night, a book that explores the author’s rich tapestry of life through childhood memories, kitchen table tales, poems, family recipes and a jazz playlist, and his latest release, This Is the Honey: An Anthology of Contemporary Black Poets, to locals and summer residents alike. Coincidentally, Alexander listens to instrumental jazz as he writes, which streams into the central themes of his books, along with sports, family, friendship and first love—according to Nantucket High School librarian Jill Surprenant, this makes him especially relevant to young readers on Nantucket. She says, “Many of his titles are written in verse—yet another draw, as readers allow the rhythm and cadence to propel them forward and keep reading.”

Music serves as a point of connection for the author, as classic mid-century American jazz allowed Alexander to finally connect with his father, a serious man who became a minister after a career in the U.S. Air Force. When Alexander discovered his father’s box of old classic jazz records in the attic of his family home, he was still a student of acclaimed poet and creative writing professor Nikki Giovanni. The music helped him appreciate his father’s humanity. Alexander explains, “When I fell in love with those jazz records, I sort of fell in love with my father. Because I realized he’s got to be a cool dude to be listening to this music. And that sort of coincided with me beginning to really write love poems in earnest. And jazz music became the soundtrack.” His early days as a poet didn’t make for a smooth chapter. His first marriage ended in divorce after just five years, and he admits that in the beginning, poetry was “not … a sustainable career for a twentysomething husband and father to a four-year-old—and the author of a book of amateurish, if not provocative, love poems that I published myself.” While his poetry is now widely celebrated (in February, he read aloud from This Is the Honey on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert), it was Alexander’s transition into children’s literature that allowed him to truly find his stride. Was it a strategic move? “Not at all,” he says, explaining how his shift in focus was simply a natural outgrowth of his love for his daughters. “I had my second daughter and my wife [said], ‘You should write a poem, a prayer for our daughter, so that she can recite it every night,’” he recalls.

As a new dad, reading aloud from children’s books by celebrated authors like Mo Willems set Alexander on a new trajectory. He adds, “Before you knew it, I had written a children’s picture book, and then another one, and then, as my kids got older, I began to write to meet the age that they were.” Eventually, Alexander ventured into the television, film and music industries,

becoming executive producer of the Emmy Award-winning series The Crossover, which was based on his Newbery Medal-winning novel of the same name. It was released on Disney+ in April of last year. This was followed by Rebound, which was shortlisted for the prestigious UK Carnegie Medal, and The Undefeated, a National Book Award nominee, Newbery Honor and Caldecott Medal-winning picture book illustrated by Kadir Nelson.

Among his other awards and accolades are the Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Prize, the Coretta Scott King Author Honor, four NAACP Image Award nominations and the 2017 Inaugural Pat Conroy Legacy Award. In 2018, he opened the Barbara E. Alexander Memorial Library and Health Clinic in Ghana, as part of LEAP for Ghana, an international literacy program he co-founded in honor of his mother, a professional educator who shines as a luminous presence throughout his memoir.