Publishing the best poetry and fiction from emerging and established voices since 1966
Showcasing work that is risk-taking or overlooked
For more than fifty years, the MFA Writing Program at UNC Greensboro has published The Greensboro Review. The journal began in 1966, when students in the first years of the MFA wanted a place to publish their creative work. With $500 from the Chancellor—“an amount that hardly covered the cost of printing 500 copies,” according to Robert Watson, poet and co-founder of the MFA program—students and faculty used the campus duplicating shop to print the debut issue, then collated it by hand. Greensboro painter Betty Watson designed the logo that is still in use today.
The mission of the journal quickly shifted from “a house organ for our MFA students,” and the Review began to publish writers like Ezra Pound and Joyce Carol Oates. But as longtime editor Jim Clark described, “the GR has always taken the most joy in publishing work by new writers at the beginning of their careers, and we are proud to include in this group such writers as Lewis Nordan, Yusef Komunyakaa, William Matthews, Alan Shapiro, Charles Simic, and Dave Smith.” In 1984, the GR established its Literary Awards thanks to an anonymous donor, and these prizes led to a more global following. Works from the journal are consistently included in the Pushcart Prize anthologies, Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Awards, New Stories from the South, and other collections honoring the finest writing by both established and emerging voices.
Today, the GR continues to be faculty- and student-run, and our editors regularly showcase writers whose work may be risk-taking or overlooked.
As of 2019, the journal is proud to partner with the University of North Carolina Press for publishing and distribution.
“The pages of the Review have been filled with some of the most outrageous barnstormers, chicken killers, schoolyard psychics, and circus performers. We publish stories about finding Eden and the fabled fruit of knowledge, about men transporting truckloads of penguins, about evil spirits entering living people and causing mental illness…stories like these exemplify both the kinds of writing we look for and the editorial eye that can spot the talent others might miss.”
From Jim Clark’s final Editor’s Note
Read all of Jim Clark’s 50th Anniversary Note and final Editor’s Note, “THIS IS IT”
Editor
Terry L. Kennedy is the author of the poetry collection New River Breakdown. His work appears in a variety of literary journals and magazines as well as Gracious: Poems for the 21st Century South, Hard Lines: Rough South Poetry, Southern Poetry Anthology, VII: North Carolina, and You are the River: Literature Inspired by the North Carolina Museum of Art . He currently serves as Director of the MFA Writing Program at UNC Greensboro and Editor of the online journal storySouth.
Associate Editor
Jessie Van Rheenen is the Assistant Director of the MFA Writing Program at Greensboro. In addition to coordinating the visiting writers series, she teaches the undergraduate fiction writing sequence and courses on contemporary publishing, workplace writing, and speculative literature.
Managing Editor
Justin Nash is a poet and visual artist from Delaware. A former intern of Copper Canyon Press and the Fine Arts Work Center, he currently serves as the Managing Editor for The Greensboro Review and is a senior reader in poetry for Cherry Tree.
Fiction Editor
Nellie Hildebrandt is a fiction writer from South Carolina and a second-year MFA student. She currently serves as Fiction Editor for The Greensboro Review. Her work has appeared in apt. You can find her on twitter @nelliefrancesh.
Fiction Editor
Sierra Stonebraker is a second-year MFA student in fiction at UNCG. Her work has appeared in The Greensboro Review and Allegory Ridge’s fiction anthology Archipelago. She grew up in the high desert of Southern California and lived in Seattle, WA for four years before moving to Greensboro. She currently serves as a Fiction Editor for The Greensboro Review.
Poetry Editor
Calista Malone is a second-year poet from the North Florida panhandle. She has an MA in Creative Writing from Auburn University. Her poems have appeared in Gulf Stream Magazine, Naugatuck River Review, Saw Palm, and elsewhere. She currently serves as a Poetry Editor for The Greensboro Review.
Poetry Editor
Caroline White is a second-year poetry student. She is the winner of the Prime Number Magazine‘s Prize for Poetry, and her work has appeared in Askew Magazine. She currently serves as a Poetry Editor for The Greensboro Review.
Editorial Assistant
Gabrielle Girard is a second-year MFA student in fiction at UNCG, where she serves as a graduate teaching assistant and editorial assistant for The Greensboro Review. Her work is available in Atlantis and Signet.
Editorial Assistant
Katie Worden is a fiction writer and second-year MFA student from New York. She is a recipient of the Fred Chappell Fellowship and the Jiménez-Porter Literary Prize. In addition to teaching undergraduate writing and composition, she currently serves as an editorial assistant for The Greensboro Review.
Editorial Assistant
Editorial Assistant
james daniels (he/him) is an interdisciplinary poet, writer, and educator from Selma, North Carolina. When he’s not writing, he currently works as a freelance poetry and hip-hop educator, a high school advocate, University Writing Center consultant, and music creator. Catch his upcoming events and further information at sollxve.com.
Editorial Board
Xhenet Aliu, Stuart Dischell, Julie Funderburk, Holly Goddard Jones, Derek Palacio, Emilia Phillips
Consulting Senior Editors
Fred Chappell, Lee Zacharias