anisfield-wolf juror and poet, our friend, rita dove. once again, we welcome rita dove. and of course, last but never least, our esteemed chair of anisfield-wolf and emcee for tonight, dr. henry louis gates, jr. affectionately known to many of us as skip, dr. gates is the founding director of the center for african and american research at harvard university, and he again is chair of the anisfield-wolf awards jury. we are blessed to have him as our host this evening and as i said to him backstage, 27 years to do anything is a long time and he's done such a great job over the years. we are so thankful to him for his service to anisfield-wolf. so with these book awards, he's done a fantastic job emceeing year after year, traveling back and forth from the east coast, so i would ask you to please, let's give a warm round of applause and warm welcome to our dear friend, skip gates. dr. henry louis gates. >> thank you so much. give it up for the reverend, ladies and gentlemen. i asked if he was going to do a prayer. he said no, not tonight. becau because, you know, i said we'r