Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/kay-ryan-reflects-on-role-as-nations-poet-laureate Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript Known for compact writing and for leading a quiet life, Kay Ryan has taken on a very public role as the nation's poet laureate. For more than 30 years, she has taught remedial English in Marin County, Calif. Her poems are often praised for their wit and wisdom. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. JIM LEHRER: Next, a conversation with the poet laureate of the United States, Kay Ryan. She spoke recently with Jeffrey Brown, part of our ongoing series on poets and poetry. JEFFREY BROWN: Known for short, compact writing and for living a very quiet life, Kay Ryan has taken on a big and very public role as the nation's poet laureate.For more than 30 years, Ryan has lived and taught remedial English in Marin County, California. Her poems are over praised for their wit, wisdom and brevity. Ryan is in Washington to award this year's Witter Bynner fellowships at the Library of Congress, part of her official duties as poet laureate, and she joins me now.And welcome.I remember when you were named as poet laureate. There was some sense of you as an unlikely laureate. And I wonder, did you feel that? KAY RYAN, poet: I felt extremely unlikely. I didn't think it would ever happen. Usually, the laureates are chosen from among the academic classes.I mean, I'm academic in the sense that I teach and have taught remedial writing skills for 33 years, but that isn't usually the group from whom the laureate is selected. Usually it's someone with a much more public profile in the creative writing world.