NER was among Jennifer Chang’s first publications as a poet.

MIDDLEBURY, Vt. – New England Review has announced that Jennifer Chang will join its staff as poetry editor. She 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.” She will begin her new position on March 1.

NER 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. 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.

Chang taught poetry at the Bread Loaf Environmental Writers’ Conference in 2019, and she received a fellowship and a scholarship to the August conferences in 2012 and 2005, respectively. 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. 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, Chang 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. Barot 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 Barot 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.

“I’ve been so grateful to have had the chance to work with Rick as poetry editor for nearly seven years,” says editor Carolyn Kuebler. “He has been a tremendous advocate for an inclusive and constantly evolving vision of poetry for NER and beyond.”

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,” says Kuebler. “We are absolutely delighted to welcome Jennifer to our editorial team.”