Dana Gioia

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Dana Gioia : biography

December 24, 1950 –

His poetry has appeared in The Norton Anthology of Poetry, The Oxford Book of American Poetry, and many other anthologies. They have been translated into French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Chinese, and Arabic. His poetry has been set to music, in styles ranging from classical to jazz and rock, by—among others—Ned Rorem, Dave Brubeck, Paquito D’Rivera, and Alva Henderson; song cycles based on his poems have been composed by Stefania de Kenessey, Lori Laitman, and Paul Salerni. Gioia has also written the libretti for the operas Nosferatu (2001; music by Alva Henderson) and Tony Caruso’s Last Broadcast (2005; music by Paul Salerni).

Gioia has received ten honorary doctorates, as of 2011. In 2005, Dana Gioia received the John Ciardi Award for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry. In 2010, Gioia was announced as the year’s recipient of the Laetare Medal from the University of Notre Dame, an honor traditionally given to an American Roman Catholic in recognition of outstanding service to the Church and to society. In 2008, Gioia was inducted into the College of Fellows of the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology.

Early years

Michael Dana Gioia —his surname is pronounced "JOY-uh"— was born in Hawthorne, California, the son of Michael Gioia and Dorothy Ortez. His younger brother is jazz historian Ted Gioia. Gioia grew up in Hawthorne, "speaking Italian in a Mexican neighborhood", he said. His father was the son of immigrants from Sicily and his mother was a native Californian of Mexican heritage. He attended Junípero Serra High School in Gardena, California.

He earned his B.A. from Stanford University in 1973, an M.A. from Harvard University in 1975, and an M.B.A. from Stanford Business School in 1977. From 1971-73, he was editor of Sequoia Magazine and then its poetry editor from 1975-77.

Writings about Dana Gioia and his work

  • April Lindner. Dana Gioia (Boise State University Western Writers Series, No. 143) (2003)
  • Jack W. C. Hagstrom and Bill Morgan. Dana Gioia: A Descriptive Bibliography with Critical Essays (2002)
  • Janet McCann, "Dana Gioia: A Contemporary Metaphysics," Renascence 61.3 (Spring 2009): 193-205.

NEA chairman

Gioia was President George W. Bush’s second choice to lead the NEA. The first, composer Michael P. Hammond, died only a week after taking office as the NEA’s eighth chairman in January 2002. Gioia said, "I found an agency that was demoralized, defensive, and unconfident. It had been under constant assault for about fifteen years and it was suffering from the institutional version of battered child syndrome", said Gioia. "I don’t think the NEA has done a very good job of serving America," he declared. By bringing a new visibility to the agency and wooing Congressional Republicans, Gioia gained a sizable increase in his agency’s budget. "Dana is a superb politician. He knows how to talk to Congress and to the arts community, and to state and federal agencies and to the complex, gigantic, fire-breathing beast called the White House," said David Gelernter of Yale University. Bill Kauffman called Gioia "the best poet in government service since President Tyler sent John Howard "Home Sweet Home" Payne to Tunis.", Reason

At the NEA, Gioia created new programs such as Shakespeare in American Communities, bringing the Bard to small towns; and NEA Jazz Masters, promoting jazz music. The NEA presents an annual award for jazz which Gioia hopes will be the jazz equivalent of a Pulitzer Prize. "We have a generation of Americans growing up who have never been to the theater, the symphony, opera, dance, who have never heard fine jazz, and who increasingly don’t read," said Gioia in justifying his efforts.

Gioia is not without critics, however. Some in the U.S. Congress,

believe the NEA should be abolished because it exceeds their view of the Constitutional functions of government. Some in the arts community fault the NEA for abandoning grants to individual artists, which were terminated after controversy over Robert Mapplethorpe, Andres Serrano, and others, to which Gioia responded, "Fellowships in prose (fiction and creative nonfiction) or poetry are available to published creative writers of exceptional talent." Gioia's new NEA programs, for which NEA has sought corporate and foundation support, worry other arts organizations because the NEA is competing with them for funding.