Jennifer Chang brings to NER her vision and experience as a deeply committed writer and literary citizen—as well as, she says, “a judicious sense of pluralism and communion.”

While Jennifer will be new to this role, she has a longstanding connection to New England Review. The magazine was among her first publications as a poet, in 2004, and more recently NER published her essay “Looking for Wong May” (2020), as part of a special feature from the 2019 Asian American Literature Festival. She has held editorial roles at Poetry Daily and ISLE, and has served on the Kate and Kingsley Tufts Poetry screening committee and as a reader for the Yale Younger Poetry Series.

Jennifer Chang is the author of two poetry collections, Some Say the Lark (Alice James Books, 2017) and The History of Anonymity (University of Georgia Press, 2008), and has published her writing in many journals, including the Believer, the Baffler, Poetry, the Literary Review, and the New Yorker. An associate professor of English at George Washington University, she is on the MFA faculty at Bennington College and co-chair of the Advisory Board of Kundiman.

New England Review, she says, “signifies a living history, a community of generous effort, and a future collectively envisioned.” This new role will allow her to “build on long-held investments in poetry’s long and varied histories.”

NER’s current poetry editor, Rick Barot, will edit two more issues—42.1 and 42.2, to be published in March and June 2021. Rick began his work as poetry editor in September 2014, when he set out, as he noted later, “to feature poetry that is representative of the variety of excellent poetry now being written in the United States, and to bring as many new poets into the magazine’s pages as possible.” In keeping with that promise, the poetry selections of one issue each year have been entirely comprised of poets who had not previously appeared in NER. At the same time he has brought to NER vital new work by poets whose influence and significance has long been recognized, as well as by those whose voices are just beginning to be heard.

Jennifer Chang’s first issue as poetry editor will be published in September 2021. Jennifer’s commitment and generosity, her deep love for poets and poetry, and her passion for the community that NER has created over the years will allow her to bring both continuity and change to our poetry section. We are so pleased to welcome her to our editorial team!