Alexander Lazarus Wolff’s writing appears online in The Best American Poetry and Poets.org, and in the North American Review, Pithead Chapel, and elsewhere. He holds a B.A. with honors in English and a minor in psychology from the College of William & Mary, where he was awarded the Academy of American Poet’s Prize. He was also awarded first place in Poetry Society of Virginia’s Undergraduate Award. He has also placed in other competitions, such as the Goronwy Owen Prize and Tiberius Gracchus Jones Prize. In addition to being poetry editor for The Plentitudes: A Quarterly International Literary Journal, he is on the editorial board for Gulf Coast and Black Fox Literary Magazine.
He was the private student of David Lehman, editor of The Oxford of American Poetry and series editor for The Best American Poetry, for over two years. He completed an honors thesis in creative writing under Henry Hart, the 17th Poet Laureate of Virginia. He also completed a private study in creative nonfiction with New York Times Bestselling author Marya Hornbacher. An MFA candidate, he teaches and studies at the University of Houston, where he is the recipient of the Inprint MD Anderson Foundation Fellowship.
His areas of research interest include contemporary poetry and creative nonfiction. He is particularly interested in Confessionalism in both the modern age and in its emergence in mid-century poetry. This interest encompasses the original confessional poets, the construction of “I”-persona in creative writing, but also the movement's larger extent on the impact and perception of mental illness. His creative plans include exploring the intersection between life, the mind, and personal experience.