Thank you for your interest in being a staff poetry reader for New England Review! Our staff readers, all volunteers, are responsible for reading and evaluating thousands of submissions each year. They play an essential role in our editorial process and in our mission to discover new voices in contemporary literature.

Qualifications: Our staff readers must be familiar with New England Review. They must have a strong background in contemporary literature, exceptional critical abilities, clear communication skills, and a strong sense of responsibility.

Requirements: Readers must treat each manuscript with respect and attention and complete their assigned work in a timely manner.

Poetry readers are assigned about 50 submissions per month, and evaluate each manuscript to determine if it should be passed on to the poetry editor or declined. Readers are asked to finish each assigned batch in four to six weeks.

Readers must create an account in Submittable in order to read submissions on a computer, phone, or tablet. They also cannot submit to the journal while they are serving as a reader.

Readers who complete their work on a regular basis are listed on our masthead and receive a complimentary print or ebook subscription to New England Review for as long as they are active as readers.

Application: If you’re interested in serving as a poetry reader for NER, please send a CV and letter of interest to our poetry editor, Rick Barot. In your letter, please describe three or four poems from recent issues of NER, online or in print, to give us a sense of your critical perspective.