About Us

was founded in 1936, when James Laughlin (1914–1997), then a twenty-two-year-old Harvard sophomore, issued the first of the New Directions anthologies. "I asked Ezra Pound for 'career advice,'" James Laughlin recalled. "He had been seeing my poems for months and had ruled them hopeless. He urged me to finish Harvard and then do 'something' useful."

James Laughlin

Barbara Epler

joined New Directions as an editorial assistant after graduating from college in 1984. She became editor in chief in 1995; named Publisher in 2008, and in 2011 became president.

Laurie Callahan

was Executive Vice President.

Declan Spring

is Executive Vice President, Senior Editor, and Director of Foreign Rights. He has been working at New Directions since 1991.

Erik Rieselbach

is the Production Manager of New Directions.

Jeffrey Yang

is Editor-at-Large at New Directions. He has been with the press since 2000.

Tynan Kogane

is Editor in Chief at New Directions. He was raised in Seattle and graduated from the New School.

Mieke Chew

is Executive Director of Publicity and Senior Editor. She grew up in Australia, where she founded Higher Arc magazine in 2011.

Chris Wait

Chris Wait is Vice President, Director of Subrights and Permissions, and Editor. He has been with New Directions since 2014.

Maya Solovej

Maya Solovej is Publicity Manager and Associate Editor at New Directions. She grew up in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Oliver Preston

is the Production Associate at New Directions.

Madeleine Nephew

is Publicist at New Directions.

Reem Hassan

is the Administrative Business Manager at New Directions.

Isabelle Cachia-Riedl

is an intern at New Directions.

Pauline Cochran

is Publicity Assistant at New Directions, as well as Subrights and Permissions Assistant.

Sylvie Pingeon

is an intern at New Directions.