James Louis Carcioppolo was born in 1945
in Cleveland, Ohio, where a number of his relatives still reside.
His mother resides in West Hills, California. His father, James
"Carcie" Carcioppolo, passed away on April 25 of this year. He was
born in Palermo, Sicily on January 1915. He arrived in American,
(Cleveland, Ohio) in his teens with his mother, 2 brothers (Carl and Sam
- a younger brother, Angelo, was born in the USA) and two
sisters (Josephine and Rosie). In his twenties he formed a band,
the FIVE SICILIANS which played at numerous weddings.
They also performed for a time on the radio. Joe Pitillo, a member of
that band, played the mandolin (he later married Jim's sister
Josephine). Mr. Carcioppolo senior married Rosalind
Kojuniczh in 1944 and moved to Los Angeles after the birth of their
son, James. A daughter, Josephine (Joni) was born in 1956. She
currently resides in Calabasas, California with her husband Rick, and
her two boys Christopher and Evan.
In addition to writing poetry, James has also written two novels.
THE RIVER, THE RIME, AND THE ROPE, the second of the two, will be
published later this year. The first, BAGTOOTH AND RANKLEDIFF, a
comical fantasy novel, is, alas, in need of extensive revision - it
is scheduled for publication sometime in 1999.
He first became aware of Cyrano de Bergerac as a child watching the classic movie
staring Jose Ferrer. The idea for a new fictional book about Cyrano
had been with James for a number of years - but he had always felt
inadquate to the task. Finally, two years ago, the concept of the book
formed, along with a few tenative sonnets - and, then, the whole
project just took off; he felt, at times, that he was taking dictation
from Cyrano himself. In some ways he was: some of the lines were taken
from Cyrano's letters and plays.
In addition to writing, James has always been interested in art. He
graduated from the Academy of Art College in San Francisco in
1977, receiving a BA in painting..
