Benjamin Alire Sáenz

Benjamin Alire Sáenz studied at University of Iowa, University of Texas at El Paso and Stanford University. The recorded working language is American English and English. The field of work recorded is poetry and children's and young adult literature. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are children's and young adult. Employment is recorded with University of Texas at El Paso. Distinctions recorded are Lambda Literary Award, American Book Awards, Tomás Rivera Award and Belpré Medal.

• Born — 16 August 1954 • Birthplace — Old Picacho, New Mexico, U.S. • Died — 28 July 2026 • Language — English • Education — St. Thomas Seminary (BA) University of Texas at El Paso (MA) • Period — 1990s–2026 • Genre — Novels, short stories, poetry, young adult literature • Subject — Hispanic and Latino American culture, LGBT • Notable Works — Carry Me Like Water, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, The Inexplicable Logic of My Life, Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club • Awards — American Book Award (1992) PEN/Faulkner Award (2013)

Sáenz was born in Old Picacho, New Mexico, and raised on a cotton farm in Mesilla, New Mexico, near Las Cruces. He earned a BA in Humanities and Philosophy from St. Thomas Seminary in Denver, Colorado, and a MA in creative writing from the University of Texas at El Paso. He continued to live and work in El Paso, Texas. After 15 years of marriage to his wife, an El Paso family court judge, he came out as gay, and they filed for divorce in 2009. Sáenz was 54 when he came out. In an interview, he confirmed that he had struggled with this topic for a long time and that he saw writing as a way to overcome it. In 2013, Benjamin Alire Sáenz became the first Latino to win the prestigious PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction with Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club. On October 29, 2022, Sáenz received the Inaugural Hummingbird Award in Literary Arts from the Tulsa City-County Library. The event was hosted by the Tulsa City-County Library and the Hispanic Resource Center. Sáenz died on July 28, 2026, at the age of 71.

• "Students I See Every Day", Santa Fe Poetry Broadside, Issue #31, February, 2003 • Do Not Mind the Bombs, Narrative Magazine

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• Carry Me Like Water, Hyperion, 1995 * * • En el tiempo de la Luz, Rayo/HarperCollins 2006 *

* * • Last Night I Sang to the Monster, Cinco Puntos Press 2009 • Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2012 • The Inexplicable Logic of My Life, Clarion Books, 2017 • Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2021

* * • "To the Desert," "Resurrections," Twentieth Century American Poetry (2004), edited by Dana Gioia, McGraw Hill