He began working at ENMU in January 2016.
"I really like that a lot of my students are first-generation students. There seems to be this desire to learn in them that I appreciate because it often seems like students are taking their education for granted. When I've taught at other universities or schools, it sometimes felt like the thirteenth grade because it's expected of them, but here it seems like people are very interested in learning. They're invested in it," explained Dr. Rizza.
He said that his peers and colleagues have been supportive and that ENMU is a good environment.
Dr. Rizza is originally from New Jersey and got his bachelor's at Rutgers University and his master's at Temple University in Philadelphia.
"I taught for a while, then I went and got my Ph.D. in South Carolina, so I was there for six years. After I graduated, I went back to New Jersey and taught at a university, but it wasn't a tenure track position, and I was still looking for one."
"I had published both a novel (Cartilage and Skin) and a revision of my dissertation, so I thought it was time for me to advance a little bit more and I applied to a bunch of schools. ENMU seemed to be a really great opportunity because they wanted someone to teach creative writing-- which I like doing--and someone to teach theory, which I also liked doing. Since I've published in both of these areas, it seemed like the perfect match," said Dr. Rizza.
He originally thought that English was his weak point because he was good at math.
"When I went to Rutgers for my bachelor's, I took an English course that kind of opened up my eyes to what serious thinking is about--beyond Stephen King."
He remembers being skeptical of English even though he enjoyed writing horror stories.
In one of his classes they were reading Jane Eyre and the professor read the first sentence--"There was no possibility of taking a walk that day"--and she paused and asked, "What's so special about the word ‘that'?" This made him realize how complicated writing can get and the possibilities of the language.
"I think I was 11 or 12 when the first book I bought on my own was Pet Sematary by Stephen King. Now that I'm older I really love William Faulkner because he's the type of writer who can create so many different characters."
He compared Faulkner to Shakespeare in the manner of you don't really know which character Shakespeare aligns himself. Dr. Rizza finds that Faulkner can lose himself in the creation of the characters.
"I've been writing short stories for a long time, even when I was a little kid I liked writing. But I don't know where that came from. My brother recently discovered something: an award I got in the fourth grade for creative writing, so apparently I've been writing since at least the fourth grade," said Dr. Rizza.
In his writing he likes to have an experimental aspect by playing with plot structure, reader expectation, and sleights-of-hand that readers might not notice the first time they read it.
Dr. Rizza finds his job as a teacher great.
"I love literature and I can't imagine doing anything else. I have always wanted to be surrounded by and talking about it. That's what I want to do, and there is no place in the business world for me to be talking about stories, books or words," explained Dr. Rizza.
He also loves that academia gives you a certain freedom to be doing what you love and encourages you to talk to people about literature.
"I like literary theory. Foucault fascinates me a lot in his critique of power. It shapes my thinking and a lot of time we fall into routine thinking and we fall into common ways of thought that everybody has, but having these theories lifts you out of the regular discourse we find in news and social media, and it gives you a broader perspective," said Dr. Rizza.
He has three young children, a five-year-old, one-and-a-half-year-old, and a newborn. His wife is a creative writer and teaches composition.
"I have no hobbies," joked Dr. Rizza, "I like to read and write."
However, Dr. Rizza also likes to cook.
"I used to own a pizzeria for two years so that was fun. It was a lot of work, but it was fun being in the kitchen, so it makes me empathetic to people who work really hard on their feet every day because I did that," said Dr. Rizza.
He also enjoys things being boisterous.
"I come from a loud family, so I'm very good with lots of people talking at once and expressing their opinions in loud ways. I guess it's my Italian background.
"So, in the classroom when people are inhibited about speaking, I want more raucous."
