Meet the Editors: Introducing Kerri Webster
We are so lucky to welcome Kerri Webster to The Idaho Review as our new Poetry Editor. Kerri is the author of three books of poetry: The Trailhead (Wesleyan, 2018); Grand & Arsenal (Iowa, 2012); and We Do Not Eat Our Hearts Alone (Georgia, 2005). She received her MFA from Indiana University. From 2006 to 2010, Webster was Writer in Residence at Washington University in St. Louis. She is the recipient of a Whiting Award and the Lucille Medwick Award from the Poetry Society of America.
Carl Phillips calls Kerri’s work “refreshing and disarming in its frankness.” Jane Mead says “Intuitive forces keep Webster’s poems moving ahead into unexpected but never gratuitous places. She can tweak the tone of a poem effortlessly at just the right moment, and her quirky vision is embodied in the most startling images."
We asked Kerri some quick-fire questions about what she hopes to bring to Idaho Review:
Q: What do you look for most when reading and reviewing submissions?
KW: Whether by emerging or established poets, I’m interested in work that uses language in surprising ways, pays attention to craft, and remembers that writing is a communicative act.
Q: What direction do you hope to take the poetry side of the The Idaho Review?
KW: Contemporary poetry in 2019 is at an exciting moment when all voices are being heard. We’ll be looking for and publishing work that draws from the full range of voices and aesthetics.
Q:What poets influence and excite you?
KW: I’m drawn to work that’s intellectually rigorous and ambitious but also moving, poetry that has something at stake. Favorite poets include Alice Notley, Claudia Rankine, Frank Bidart, Anne Carson, Maggie Nelson, and Hoa Nguyen.
Q: Fun Fact?
KW:Fun fact: the last time I worked on a literary journal was twenty years ago—another IR, the Indiana Review, in grad school at Indiana University. I remember holding bake sales to help fund the magazine, and I’m grateful for BSU’s whole-hearted support of the Idaho Review because I really can’t bake.
For more information on poetry submissions visit our submittalbe here: https://theidahoreview.submittable.com/submit/148215/poetry-submission-2019