Finding Joseph Tusiani

Poet, fiction writer, essayist, translator, and professor, Joseph Tusiani has distinguished himself in so many ways. He was the first American ever to win England’s prestigious Greenwood Prize; President Kennedy invited him to record his poetry (an hour-long tape) for the Archives of the Library of Congress; Joseph also held the position of vice president of the Poetry Society of America—great accomplishments each in their own right, let alone all part of a most distinguished career of one individual, which includes further accolades still.


Joseph’s books and essays are many; he published his creative work in four different languages (English, Italian, dialect, Latin), his critical work in two. His translations have, in turn, introduced the English-speaking world to the works of numerous Italian writers. Further still, he continues to create, as always, splendid work.


In the meantime, we leave you with one of Joseph’s signature poems:

ETHNICITY

O new awareness of my ancient light,

What’s then so new about this earth of mine?

Though everything you seem to redefine.

‘Tis but a tale of night excluding night

So I discover what in me was bright

Long before brightness was allowed to shine,

Able at last to trace and underline

Letter and spirit of my simple right.


Now, only now the truth I understand—

That, born as mortal as a bird or bat,

Man ever longs for some immortal land

Brother, you came from Erin, I from Rome,

And others started hence—but what of that?

Today migration and tomorrow home.



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