Alberto Álvaro Ríos

Alberto Álvaro Ríos is an award-winning author and Arizona’s Poet Laureate. Ríos first appeared on Arizona PBS as the host of “Books & Co.” from 2009 – 2018, hosted “Art in the 48” in 2019 – 2020, and is now the host of "From the Vault." Ríos is the author of 10 books and chapbooks of poetry, three collections of short stories and a memoir.

Ríos is the recipient of the Western Literature Association Distinguished Achievement Award, the Arizona Governor’s Arts Award, fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, the Walt Whitman Award, the Western States Book Award for Fiction, six Pushcart Prizes in both poetry and fiction, and inclusion in “The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry,” as well as over 250 other national and international literary anthologies. His work is regularly taught and translated, and has been adapted to dance and both classical and popular music.

Ríos is a Regents’ Professor at Arizona State University, where he has taught for more than 30 years and where he holds the further distinction of the Katharine C. Turner Endowed Chair in English.