The Poets of New Jersey
~ From Colonial to Contemporary ~

Edited by Emanuel di Pasquale, Frank Finale, and Sander Zulauf

Interview with editors Emanuel di Pasquale, Frank Finale, and Sander Zulauf

October 2005

"The Poets of New Jersey" editors Sander Zulauf, Frank Finale, and Emanuel di Pasquale
on the beach at Long Branch, Sunday, October 9, 2005.

What inspired you to edit and create this book?

E.D.: The ocean with its expanse jump-started us into an awareness of the expanse of the poetical voice in New Jersey.

F.F.: Having co-edited an anthology of poems with Rich Youmans about the Jersey Shore (Under a Gull's Wing, Down The Shore Publishing), I realized there was a need for an anthology of poets from New Jersey that combined the past poets with the present ones. To my knowledge, there were no anthologies of that type. When Emanuel approached me with the idea of doing one and told me that X. J. Kennedy would be willing to do the Introduction, the winds of inspiration filled my sails. Sandy and Emanuel's enthusiasm for the book and hard work towards achieving it were significant factors—inspiration begets inspiration. Finally, as a long time educator, I have a desire for people to know that, over the years, New Jersey has offered America many well-known poets.

S.Z.: As Editor of the Journal of New Jersey Poets, I have long been aware of the tremendous number of excellent poets past and present who have called this place home. When Emanuel di Pasquale approached me in 2001 and suggested we do this book, it seemed like a good idea to me, and Emanuel was extremely enthusiastic and energetic and very persuasive about it, so I agreed to co-edit the book with him.

How did you arrive at the decision to organize the book as a chronological anthology—from Colonial to Contemporary?

E.D.: Like all arts, poetry is continuous: poets as brothers and sisters.

F.F.: Being a book about the past blending into the present, a chronological order seemed the most natural.

S.Z.: We decided to include the most important poets who have lived here in the past and some of the most talented poets who are living and writing here today; the earlier poets fell to me, and Emanuel and Frank Finale took on the job of selecting the contemporary poets.

How did you go about compiling your list of poets and poems?

ED: Four things guided me: 1) The immortals (Whitman, etc.); 2) The fine prize winners (Dunn, etc.); 3) Those poets who have their own unmistakable voices; 4) From a pool of contemporaries who (as history shows us in all the arts and even in the sciences) tend to use the same style, we chose those that we thought were a cut above.

F.F.: From the great poets of the past, to fine prize-winning poets, and to a few little know poets with their own voice and originality.

S.Z.: Having taught American Literature at County College of Morris for many years, it was relatively easy for me to pick out the many important American poets from New Jersey and focus on poems of theirs that are easily classified as “essential” as well as including personal favorites—the privilege of editing such a book as this one. Philip Freneau, Walt Whitman, Stephen Crane, and William Carlos Williams are all poets who contributed greatly to the development of American poetry from the time of this nation's founding to the modernists of the twentieth century.

How long did it take you to edit and create the book?

E.D.: Four years.

F.F.: Four years—the time it usually takes for a typical college education. It wasn't just a matter of choosing poems and putting them into a book. As Sandy mentions, so much more was involved.

S.Z.: It took four years for us to get the contents determined, to secure a publisher, to secure permissions from poets and publishers to reprint the poems that are not in public domain, and to proofread the book into its current magnificent shape. When the project began, I was just beginning a sabbatical leave to write a screenplay based on the short, brilliant, and fascinating life of Stephen Crane and found myself suddenly inundated with poetry manuscripts from everywhere. I had to step back from the project to get my sabbatical project completed, and that is when Frank Finale joined Emanuel to select and edit the contemporary poets. When I delivered my list of poems from Freneau up to A. R. Ammons, Kenneth Burke, Allen Ginsberg, and Denise Levertov late in 2002, I realized I was in charge of the “Dead Poets Society” section of the manuscript. There are also several people whom I have never met who were essential in its creation—we would still be working on it without them: Lorin Rizco, who typed the manuscript, and Judy Cardella, of Jersey Shore Publications, who did a wonderful job with typesetting and layout.

As long-term teachers, has the appreciation of poetry in the classroom by students as well as teachers changed from when you started to present day?

E.D.: If you teach poetry right, it is exactly the same.

F.F.: I feel more students memorized and read poems they liked when I started teaching, but students today seem more interested in trying to write poems rather than reading or memorizing them.

S.Z.: I have always been delighted when my students realize the empowerment poetry gives them at any stage of their lives when confronted with monolithic and faceless powers—whether they are social, religious, biological, economic, or political. Once the spark of free expression lights the fire within them, the result is an excitement over the authenticity of their life experiences that only poetry can give. It is the art form that truly belongs to every human being. I don't believe, however, that the teaching of poetry has changed, in spite of the tremendous good work being done by the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, the Academy of American Poets, the Poetry Society of America, and Poets House in Manhattan. Most of my students, when asked their favorite author, still write “Edgar Allen [sic] Poe.”

Where do you see poetry standing in America's artistic landscape today?

E.D.: In a world that is ugly and destructive, poetry offers Beauty and Order. It guides us with its spiritual strength: passion controlled by art.

F.F.: Although it is a rich art, it is not a moneymaking art. Because of that, it stands on the periphery of America's artistic landscape. Too many people in America today value money and power and the activities that can provide them with that. I feel that there will always be a need for poetry. When things go awry, many turn to poetry. I thank my publisher, George Valente, for having the courage to publish "a poetry anthology," when many other publishers would shun doing so.

S.Z.: I don't know how to honestly answer this question. I have always thought poetry to be the poor stepchild of the Arts because nobody can figure out how to make any money writing it. That's because very few people go out and buy it, and fewer still actually sit down and read it. As Howard Nemerov once said, you can, however, make a good deal of money talking about it. I also thought that, since little money was involved, it remained the one art form in America, where everything is about money, the one art form incorruptible by money. Now, however, with contests and phony anthologies popping up every other day, luring people in with promises of prizes and publication, and then selling them copies of the books with their poems in them for upwards of a hundred dollars, and with Poetry Magazine in Chicago getting a windfall of $110,000,000.00 from the heiress to the Eli Lilly fortune, things are starting to get a little corrupt.

How did you meet and get to know the other two editors?

E.D.: Met them at poetry readings; through journals.

F.F.: I met Sandy through the Journal of New Jersey Poets and through publishing a poem of his in Without Halos, a literary magazine that I was Editor-and-Chief of in the eighties and nineties. I met Emanuel at a poetry reading for Under a Gull's Wing in West Long Branch. Later we became good friends.

S.Z.: I had known of Emanuel's work since his first book, Genesis, was published by Boa Editions twenty-five years ago. I have known Frank's poetry from the Journal of New Jersey Poets and his other books, including Under a Gull's Wing and To the Shore Once More. I first worked with Emanuel when I suggested he translate the work of the late New Jersey poet Joe Salerno into Italian, which won a prize and began his successful career as a translator of poetry from English to Italian and from Italian to English. His new book, Na Vota, (“One Time”), is a marvelous tri-lingual book of his experiences growing up in Ragusa in Sicily (English, Italian, and Sicilian) with lovely illustrations. It is a book that gives me the same feeling I get when I read the beautifully rich and moving poetry of Pablo Neruda.

Do you have a favorite poet and a favorite poem in the book?

E.D.: I like Elinor Wylie's ballad...sweet (never mean)...my favorite poet of all time is Aeschylus, but he never saw New Jersey.

F.F.: There would be a list of them, besides that's like trying to pick a favorite son or daughter. It's something I would be reluctant to do.

S.Z.: My favorite poem is “Elegy for Wally.” My second favorite is “Where Time Goes.” I leave it up to the reader to figure out who wrote them.

As a poet yourself, what do you find inspiring about living in New Jersey?

E.D.: The ocean, above all else; the stars in the sky over the ocean some of the sweet people that live in New Jersey.

F.F.: The sound, sight, and smell of the ocean in its many variations. Also, the Pine Barrens with its unique flora, fauna, and legends.

S.Z.: The pride of the Garden State: my homegrown Tomatoes.