Edward J. Carvalho is a twice-nominated Pushcart Prize poet (2004-2005), MFA recipient (Goddard College 2006), and PhD candidate in the Literature and Criticism program at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short (Fine Tooth Press, 2007) and “If the radiance of a thousand suns”: Songs of the American Hiroshima (Six Bad Apples Press, 2008-09). His poems––once described as “original, innovative, imaginative and brutal”––have appeared along with his essays, reviews, and critical papers in numerous journals throughout the country. His interview with poet Martín Espada, “A branch on the Tree of Whitman: Martín Espada on the 150th Anniversary of Leaves of Grass,” was recently published by Quay and accepted for re-publication in the Walt Whitman Quarterly Review (University of Iowa, Summer 2008). In June 2008, Carvalho will present a paper on Whitman as one of fifteen international applicants in the Whitman International Seminar and Symposium, Dortmund, Germany. He will also guest edit Dr. David B. Downing's Works and Days journal on Academic Freedom and Intellectual Activism in the Post-9/11 University, which will feature his interviews with Noam Chomsky, Martín Espada, and Cornel West, along with new scholarship from other notable intellectuals (Spring/Fall 2008). Additionally, he is the recent recipient of Indiana University of Pennsylvania’s Twentieth and Twenty-First Annual IUP Doctoral Fellowships (2006, 2008) and employed there with a Teaching Associateship in the English Department. Carvalho was born in Connecticut in 1970.

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Press Quotes

"[ . . . ] Carvalho appeals to the cynical, skeptical, paranoid schizophrenic in all of us, and by accomplishing that makes us feel all the more normal for being so."––Brett Bowland (Indiana University of Pennsylvania student)

"[Carvalho] has successfully formulated a personal mythology—one that attempts to reconcile humanity’s role in the unpredictable twenty-first century. Although grim and at times melancholy, his poems evoke a certain pathos that encourages the reader/listener to move beyond the synthetic world and into the realm of the metaphysical.

It was an honor to host Mr. Carvalho and our college community looks forward to future visits. I recommend this modern wordsmith for those who dare to embrace work set outside of societal perimeters."
––Stacey L. Mascia (Assistant Professor and Humanities Coordinator, North Country Community College, SUNY)

"For the first time in a long, long time I did not read part of the first poem in a new book of poetry and feel a surge of disappointment. Lucky me: I had the opposite experience with this book [solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short] of amazing and wonderful poems [. . .] Carvalho never let me down; I didn't get just a couple of good poems. I went on to meet all kinds of brilliantly vivid (although often very sad) characters, and am rereading/remeeting them still."
––Dr. Judith Villa (Indiana University of Pennsylvania)

"The title indicates a Hobbesian view of the world, and Carvalho’s book is not for the faint of heart, but I couldn’t call the book bleak. It is full of humor, original language and insights."
––Doug Holder, Editor and Publisher (Ibbetson Street Press)

“If Henry Miller, Walt Whitman, and Edgar Allan Poe had an intellectual love child, this book [solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short] may well have been the result."
––Jennifer M. Woolston (Indiana University of Pennsylvania)

“Carvalho’s words come screaming off the pages. Intense, Angry, Awesome.”
––Brian J. Kenney

“[Carvalho] stirs up a mean plate of angst-ridden chili…he don’t clean the plate or nothing.”
––Roy Rideour

“I like his exuberance and a kind of whirling energy. Original, innovative, imaginative, brutal––all of these things combine to make his poetry distinctive and special.”
––Dr. James Scrimgeour, Co-Director Graduate Studies, Western Connecticut State University

“His ears are well-acquainted with all sorts of sounds.”
––The Echo

“The intensity of emotion, accompanied by explicit, graphic, and erotic content, and the free-wheeling lines echo the distinctly American voices of Walt Whitman and Allen Ginsberg.”
––Patricia Daddona, The Newtown Bee

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Edward J. Carvalho is an Active Member of the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society, Indiana University of Pennsylvania--Chapter 266.