Dissonant Voices

Joseph Pizza is associate professor of English at Belmont Abbey College. He lives in Cornelius, North Carolina.

Dissonant Voices takes on a fascinating, understudied topic: the role played by jazz and interracial dialogue in the formation of postwar ‘New American Poetry.’ Pizza’s exciting book breaks new ground and opens fertile territory for the study of both American poetry and the deep influence of jazz on American literature and culture." - Andrew Epstein, author, The Cambridge Introduction to American Poetry since 1945"Back in my student days, I read the minutes of a Black Mountain College meeting that discussed admitting African American students in a state that was segregated by law. I recognized the importance of that set of minutes, and have been awaiting the arrival of a scholar who would look into this history more closely. Joseph Pizza is the first to do this so thoroughly." - Aldon L. Nielsen, author, The Inside Songs of Amiri Baraka