Poet Laureate of New Jersey

Who is Poet Laureate of New Jersey?

The Poet Laureate of New Jersey was an honor presented biennially by the Governor of New Jersey to a distinguished New Jersey poet. Created in 1999, this position existed for less than four years and was abolished by the legislature effective 2 July 2003. When the New Jersey State Legislature created the laureate position, the bill provided specifically for the creation of an award named in honor of twentieth-century poet and physician William Carlos Williams who resided in Rutherford, New Jersey. However, the legislature recognized that the award's recipient would "be considered the poet laureate of the State of New Jersey for a period of two years." Before the position was abolished, only two poets, Gerald Stern and Amiri Baraka, had been appointed as the state's poet laureate.

The legislature's bill was signed into law by Governor Christine Todd Whitman. It was expected that the award's recipient—the poet laureate—would "engage in activities to promote and encourage poetry within the State and shall give no fewer than two public readings within the State each year." In this respect, New Jersey's poet laureate was similar to the position of Poet laureate in other American states and in several other countries. However, a public reading in September 2002 by the state's second laureate, Newark-based poet Amiri Baraka of his poem "Somebody Blew Up America" was met with harsh criticism by the public and news media. The poem which explores terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001 was considered to be violent, incendiary and anti-Semitic, and the ensuing controversy ignited a political firestorm. Because of Baraka's defiant refusals to apologize or resign as poet laureate and that there was no mechanism within the law to remove him, the position was abolished by the legislature and Governor James E. McGreevey in 2003.