ALBERT F. MORITZ was born on April 15, 1947, in Niles, Ohio, USA, and educated at Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from which he received a Ph.D. in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British poetry. His most recent books of poems are The Garden: a poem and an essay (2021), As Far As You Know (2020), and The Sparrow: Selected Poems (2018). He has published 20 books of poems and his poetry has received various recognitions including the Guggenheim Fellowship; inclusion in the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets; the Ingram Merrill Fellowship; the Award in Literature of the American Academy of Arts and Letters; the Bess Hokin Prize of Poetry magazine; the Elizabeth Matchett Stover Award of the Southwest Review; the ReLit Award; the Griffin Poetry Prize; the Raymond Souster Award of the League of Canadian Poets, and selection to the Collecíon Legítima Defensa of the Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas (Mexico; distinguished foreign authors in translation). He is a three-time finalist for the Governor General’s Award for English language poetry for his books Rest on the Flight into Egypt (1999), The Sentinel (2008), and The New Measures (2012); his book As Far As You Know (2020) was a finalist for the Ontario Trillium Award. In January 2019 he was selected Poet Laureate of the City of Toronto and served in that role until May 2023.
“I’m not a fan of poetry competitions, but once again I have to admit that if the Griffin means having an anthology of this quality every year, then it can’t be all bad.” — Elliptical Movements Blog