Emily Berry has been named as the new editor of the Poetry Society’s quarterly Poetry Review magazine. She succeeds Maurice Riordan, who has been editor since 2013.  

Berry grew up in London and studied English at Leeds University, and creative and life writing at Goldsmiths College. She is currently completing a PhD in creative and critical writing at the University of East Anglia. In 2008 she won an Eric Gregory award and her first book of poems, Dear Boy (Faber, 2013), won the Forward prize for best first collection and the Hawthornden prize. Her second collection, Stranger, Baby, will be published by Faber in 2017.

She said: “It’s been great to witness the development of the magazine over the last few years and I intend to build on this good work by continuing to expand the magazine’s reach and scope, and to bring poems to all who need them!”

Judith Palmer, director of the Poetry Society, said: “The Poetry Review has flourished under Maurice Riordan’s editorship, growing in reputation and readership. The Poetry Society has benefited enormously from Maurice’s wit and wisdom, and he’ll be much missed. We welcome Emily Berry warmly and are excited to see the new ideas she’ll now bring to the magazine. We can’t wait to read her first issue.”

Maurice Riordan described his successor as “an outstanding and innovative poet, gifted with a receptive and searching intelligence, who has a broad and informed knowledge of contemporary poetry. I anticipate her tenure will be an exciting time for the magazine. She is just the person to take the Poetry Review to a new level.”