Jiarong Zhang is a rising star in the literary arts. It has been said that the true frontier in poetry is not finding new ways to experiment, but instead carving a space for innovation within received traditions. Ms. Zhang expertly employs postmodern and post-conceptual innovation in service of larger questions about identity, family, culture, and inheritance. In doing so, she also creates a capacious and wide-ranging definition of what experimentation can be.
Jiarong Zhang researches macroeconomics and writes historical biographies at Oxford University on the Rhodes Scholarship. Her work has appeared or been recognized by The Kenyon Review, BOAAT Journal, The Black Warrior Review, The Adroit Journal, the She/Rose Exhibition at the Kennedy Center, and the Best of the Net. She previously worked as an intern at the Academy of American Poets and led the project with EX/POST Magazine to write the world’s longest community letter dedicated to loneliness in the pandemic. Jiarong is her middle name and she writes from the landscapes of Massachusetts, England, and California.