ABOUT

William James Austin lives in New York City and remains addicted to its dystopian landscape. To date he has authored five collections of poetry, essays, and "photopo": 1 UNDERWORLD 2 and 3 UNDERWORLD 4 (S Press); 5 UNDERWORLD 6, 7 UNDERWOR(L)D 8: TRANSTEXTUAL and 9 UNDERWOR(L)D 0: DESOLATION PARADISE (Koja Press); plus the book length monograph, A DECONSTRUCTION OF T. S. ELIOT: THE FIRE AND THE ROSE (Salzburg University Studies).

WJA's poetry, fiction, theoretical essays, book reviews, letters and visual art have appeared or been exhibited in The Paterson Literary Review, The American Book Review, Blaze, Louisiana Literature, The New Laurel Review, Xavier Review, Koja, Black October, The Small Press Review, BluR -- the Boston Literary Review, Masthead, The World Healing Book (a 9/11 anthology from Iceland), Fell Swoop, Appearances, A Shout in the Street (as Allen Ginsberg's B-side), The Tulane Literary Review, The Chronicle of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, Scrambled Eggs, Timbuktu, Contemporary Jewish-American Dramatists and Poets (Greenwood Press), Spidertangle: The Book, Gallerichickenscratch, American Poetry (by Igor Satanovsky), Magazinnik (in Russian translation), The Contemporary Review, xStream, Here and Now (Boston Public Radio), eratio, Moria, Turntable and Blue Light, The Instanbul Literary Review, Caiete Internationale de Poezie (in Romanian translation), Origini (sponsored by the International Association of Romanian Writers and Artists, Inc.), The June 30th Manifesto (ed. John M. Bennett and Scott Helms, Luna Bisconte Productions), Black Zinnias (forthcoming -- sponsored by the California Institute of Arts and Letters), The Best of Generator Press (CD Rom), Le Cirque: The Soundtrack (CD), Fiera Lingue (the Italian journal of science and culture), the Durban Segnini Gallery (Miami), Gallery 324 (Cleveland), Tacheles (Berlin), the Fort Worth Art Center, and other alleyways of saintly and ill repute. In Manhattan he has performed at the Poetry Project, Ear Inn, the Knitting Factory, the Bowery Club, KGB, and a truckload of similar venues. In addition, and often in conjunction with the eclectic concert event, Cirque du Singe Brisé, he performs in cities and at universities throughout the USA northeast.

WJA's poetry has won a number of awards and near-misses, including an AAP award, two nominations for the Pushcart Prize by Richard Kostelanetz and BLuR: The Boston Literary Review, a Here and Now (Boston Public Radio) award, and second place in the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Award competition. In 2001 he performed at the Ohio State University Avant-Garde Symposium. A Russian translation of his long poem, "aeneas in hell," was the subject of a session at the Stevens Institute of Technology Biennial Translation Conference in 2002. He has been filmed and/or interviewed for PBS, NTV, Boston/Cambridge local television, the Cervena Barva Press interview series, and for the Romanian journal, Caiete Internationale de Poezie. In addition, his poetry and poetics are featured on a series of postcards issued by Cervena Barva Press, and are the subject of several articles by two celebrated Romanian artists, scholars, critics and translators: Stefan Stoenescu and Mirela Roznoveanu. Professor Stoenescu is currently translating UNDERWOR(L)D: Selected Writings for book publication in Romania.

Along with Igor Satanovsky, Mike Magazinnik, Julia Solis, Bill Keith, Richard Kostelanetz, and a growing list of experimental Russian language writers, WJA publishes with Koja Press which has been featured in a New York Times article, on BBC news, and on NTV.

In a former life WJA composed music and lyrics for Lou Rawls, the fusion group: Hammer, an embarrassing television sitcom, and other rock and jazz beez and wannabeez.

WJA received his Ph.D. on Fellowship from Tulane University in New Orleans, and is currently Associate Professor of English and Philosophy and the Artistic Director of the Visiting Writers Program at the State University of New York, Farmingdale.

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