Editing Ted Kooser (section)

===Career===
After earning his MA, Kooser worked at Bankers Life Nebraska.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://nebraskaauthors.org/authors/ted-kooser|title=Ted Kooser |publisher=Nebraska Authors}}</ref> He eventually went on to work for Lincoln Benefit Life (a subsidiary of Allstate), an insurance company, for 35 years before retiring as vice president at the age of 60.<ref>{{cite book|author=Various|title=Good Poems, American Places|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r4me3_4ndTQC&pg=PT237|date=14 April 2011|publisher=Penguin Group US|isbn=978-1-101-47619-2|page=237}}</ref> He wrote for an hour and a half before work every morning, and by the time he retired, Kooser had published seven books of poetry.<ref name=":3" /> Kooser taught as a Presidential Professor in the English department of the [[University of Nebraska-Lincoln]] and is currently a Professor Emeritus.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://directory.unl.edu/people/tkooser2 |publisher=University of Nebraska Lincoln|title=Ted Kooser &#124; Directory &#124; University of Nebraska–Lincoln }}</ref>

On August 12, 2004, he was named [[Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry]] by the [[Librarian of Congress]] to serve a term from October 2004 through May 2005.

In April 2005, Theodore J. Kooser was appointed to serve a second term as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry. During that same week, Kooser received the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his book ''Delights & Shadows''<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|url=https://www.coppercanyonpress.org/books/delights-shadows-by-ted-kooser/|title = Delights & Shadows by Ted Kooser}}</ref> ([[Copper Canyon Press]], 2004). [[Edward Hirsch]] wrote: "There is a sense of quiet amazement at the core of all Kooser's work, but it especially seems to animate his new collection of poems, ''Delights & Shadows''."

Kooser's most recent books are ''Kindest Regards: New and Selected Poems'' and ''Red Stilts'' (2020).

He founded and hosted the newspaper project "American Life in Poetry".<ref>{{Cite web|last=Kooser|first=Ted|title=American Life in Poetry|url=https://www.americanlifeinpoetry.org/|access-date=2020-11-03|website=www.americanlifeinpoetry.org}}</ref> In 2020, Kooser chose [[Kwame Dawes]], a chancellor of the [[Academy of American Poets]], to be his successor as of January 1, 2021.<ref>{{Cite web|last=KHGI|date=2020-09-09|title=Kwame Dawes named successor for national "American Life in Poetry" column|url=https://nebraska.tv/news/local/kwame-dawes-named-successor-for-national-american-life-in-poetry-column|access-date=2020-11-03|website=KHGI}}</ref> Kooser also edits the Ted Kooser Contemporary Poetry series published by the [[University of Nebraska Press]].