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About Pangyrus

Pangyrus is a literary magazine that is dedicated to art, ideas, and making culture thrive. Our name is a portmanteau of pangea (the world continent) and gyrus (the folds on the cerebral cortex of the brain). Pangyrus is about connection. We bring readers to make unexpected connections across a wide range of ideas, genres, and geographies. All that is worthy of thought and consideration, you’ll find here.

The name’s echo of “papyrus” is deliberate: we engage with political and social issues, but edit for writing that will stand the test of time. Our hybrid publishing model — two to three posts per week online and two print editions a year — allows us the flexibility to publish topical opinion pieces and reviews alongside poetry, comics, memoir and fiction.

Thank you for reading. Thank you for submitting your work. And thank you for donating so that we may continue ours.

Meet the Staff

Greg Harris

Founding Editor

Greg Harris was born in Boston and received his MFA in Creative Writing from Oregon State University. He has taught writing at Harvard University since 2003. Greg has been the recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship and grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Oregon’s Regional Arts and Culture Council. His audio recording “Champion of Hot Peppers” won a 2001 National Parenting Publications Association Gold Medal for storytelling. His translation of Seno Gumira Ajidarma’s novel Jazz, Perfume, and the Incident was published as part of the Modern Library of Indonesia (2012). He has published in The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and elsewhere.

Amanda Lewis

Managing Editor

Amanda Lewis is a former literary agent who represented bestselling authors of young adult and middle grade novels, picture books, and children’s nonfiction. She is a graduate of Wellesley College and the Harvard/Radcliffe Publishing Program. She writes, paints, and cooks in Winchester, Ma.

Virginia Pye

Fiction Editor

Virginia Pye is the author of four award-winning books of fiction, including two post-colonial historical novels set in China, River of Dust and Dreams of the Red Phoenix, and the short story collection, Shelf Life of Happiness. Her most recent novel, The Literary Undoing of Victoria Swann, is a love story to writers and readers set in Gilded Age Boston. Her essays have appeared in The New York Times, Literary Hub, Publisher’s Weekly, Writer’s Digest and elsewhere. She has taught writing at NYU and Penn and currently serves on the boards of the Women’s National Book Association, Boston Chapter and of History Cambridge. Please visit her at: www.virginiapye.com.

Cheryl Clark Vermeulen

Poetry Editor

Cheryl Clark Vermeulen is an Assistant Professor in Liberal Arts at Massachusetts College of Art and Design. Her poems and translations have appeared in Caketrain, Jubilat, Third Coast, TWO LINES Online, DIAGRAM, EOAGH, Split Rock Review, Inertia Magazine, admit2, Carve [poems], Dispatx, Propeller Quarterly, Thermos blog, and eXchanges, as well as the anthology Connecting Lines: New Poetry from Mexico. She is the author of the chapbook Dead-Eye Spring (Cy Gist Press) and a recipient of a Massachusetts Cultural Council’s Artist Fellowship. She received an M.F.A. from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, after working for a decade in non-profit organizations. Raised in a suburb south of Chicago, she has lived in Boston since 1998.

Yelena Chzhen

Assistant Managing Editor and Social Media Director

Yelena lives in London with her husband, two kids, a dog and a cat. A few years ago she left her career in financial consulting to do what she has always loved--write. She writes book reviews on her blog and for UK magazines, works in a school of creative writing, and in her spare time enjoys pottery.

Deborah Norkin

Zest! Editor

Deborah Norkin is a chef, editor, writer and teacher. Her features, essays and fiction have appeared in magazines, literary journals, and newspapers. She is the President of the Boston Chapter of the Women’s National Book Association. She holds a BS in Nutrition from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a Professional Chef’s Diploma from the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts, and an MBA in Marketing from Rutgers Business School. Deborah doesn’t only write about food, but she will always write about food.

Cynthia Bargar

Associate Poetry Editor

Cynthia Bargar’s poems have appeared in many journals including LUMINA, Comstock Review, Gargoyle, Driftwood Press, Sonic Boom, Stoneboat Literary Journal, and Poems2Go. Her forthcoming debut collection, Sleeping in the Dead Girl’s Room, will be published by The Lily Poetry Review Press in 2022. She lives and writes in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

Susannah Borysthen-Tkacz

Associate Nonfiction Editor

Susannah Borysthen-Tkacz is a librarian at Cambridge Public Library, where she leads several book groups, coordinates writing classes, and purchases books (with much relish) for the collection. She writes creative nonfiction and dabbles in fiction. Her work has appeared in Creative Nonfiction, New Limestone Review, and Five Minutes.

Apratim Gautam

Columns Editor

Apratim Gautam is originally from London and works in economic policy and international development. He has lived and worked in South East Asia and East Africa, and enjoys writing fiction and nonfiction, across politics, philosophy and public policy. Apratim loves writing, cooking, reading, and eating anything of interest in New York City.

Kayla Griffin

Print Production Manager

Kayla Griffin (she/her) is a Production Editor in academic publishing, where she oversees book publications and manages several scholarly journals. She received her degree in Writing, Literature, and Publishing from Emerson College in 2018. A Boston transplant from Phoenix, Arizona, she enjoys experiencing all four seasons, binge reading, cooking, and spending time with her cats.

Christelle Saintis-Miller

Schooled Editor

Christelle Saintis-Miller has over a decade of experience in education. She has taught all ages, from nursery schoolers to adults, in the US as well as abroad in both Thailand and Honduras. She currently works full time as a Senior Program Manager for a global education program at a think tank in Washington, DC where she enjoys impacting education beyond the walls of a classroom (though she does miss connecting with students!). She is an avid reader and dabbles in writing when inspiration strikes.

Anri Wheeler

Nonfiction Editor

Anri Wheeler is a writer, educator, and mother. She facilitates workshops on identity and antiracism for schools and nonprofits. She is a graduate of GrubStreet’s Memoir Incubator, Tin House, and VONA. Her essays and book reviews have appeared in LitHub, The Boston Globe, The Independent, Hippocampus, and Romper, among others. More at anriwheeler.com.

Aime Card

Generations Editor

Aime Card is author of And Beneath it all Was Love, a memoir about her experience with breast cancer. Her current work in progress is an historical nonfiction narrative about a women's track team in 1960 and their journey to the Olympics from her hometown in Nashville. On the best days you can find her walking a beach on the North Shore of Boston with her sidekicks, Serendipity and Moose, baking with her daughter, listening to her son bang on the drums, or with a glass of wine in her hand by the firepit with her husband.

Darya Dolgopolova

Communications Assistant

Darya (Dasha) is a recent journalism and psychology graduate. In her spare time, she likes to read, customize clothes, and write short stories. She has lived in Bulgaria and Nantucket, but calls Kazakhstan her home.

Amy Glynn

In Sickness and In Health Editor

Amy Glynn has been working in public health for over the past decade, focusing on health disparities research and evaluation to improve care for complex needs populations. In her spare time, she writes a newsletter, Outtakes, about bloopers from her life. She was recently accepted into the Pioneer Valley Writing Workshop year-long revision program where she is finishing her first novel. When not writing or working, she is usually out hiking with her partner or drinking cold brew on the couch with her two cats.

Matthew Koentjoro

Social Media and Marketing Manager

Matthew Koentjoro is a Boston-based marketing expert and writer of fantasy fiction, children’s books, and roleplay games. He specializes in helping game developers, authors, and similar creators build brands and leverage social media for platform growth and sales. You can see him in action on his DungeonGlitch and Gemmed Firefly brands on Twitter and gaming on Twitch.

Esther Weeks

Graphic Designer and Web Developer

Esther Weeks has a BA in Studio Art from St. Olaf College and a MFA in Visual Information and Instructional Design from Harvard Extension School. She leads a semi-nomadic life working as a Park Ranger for the National Park Service, usually in the Western United States. She enjoys hiking, photography, videography, and travel.

Rachel West

Science Editor

Rachel is a biologist, writer, editor, and educator from New Hampshire who loves exploring the outdoors and sharing her passion for nature with others. She has published in the Boston Globe and numerous scientific journals, and has written radio spots for the Montshire Museum of Science (VT) describing some of the wonders of the natural world to listeners of all ages. She has taught Environmental Science at a community college and led dozens of hands-on natural science workshops in elementary schools. She holds multiple science degrees, and has studied writing at the University of New Hampshire, Grub Street, and Creative NonFiction. She continues to expand her skills through MFA coursework and by volunteering with Biodiversity for a Liveable Climate.

Whitney Scharer

Associate Fiction Editor

Whitney Scharer is the author of The Age of Light, a Boston Globe and IndieNext bestseller that was named one of the best books of 2019 by Parade, Glamour Magazine, Real Simple, Refinery 29, Booklist and Yahoo. Internationally, The Age of Light won Le prix Rive Gauche à Paris, was a coups de couer selection from the American Library in Paris, and has been published in over a dozen other countries. Whitney is the recipient of a 2020 Massachusetts Cultural Council Artists Fellowship in Fiction, and has been awarded residencies at the Mount, The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Ragdale. She grew up in Denver, Colorado and now lives with her husband and daughter in Arlington, MA, where she is at work on her second novel.

Kristin Bair

Associate Fiction Editor

Kristin Bair is the author of the novels Agatha Arch Is Afraid of Everything, The Art of Floating, and Thirsty—with her fourth, Clementine Crane Prefers Not To, due out in 2025. Her essays about Facebook mom groups (gah!), literary citizenship, China, bears, and more have appeared in a variety of publications, everything from Scary Mommy to the Gettysburg Review. Kristin received an MFA in Creative Writing from Columbia College Chicago, teaches for the Yale Writers’ Workshop, and leads writing workshops in classrooms and conferences around the globe. Visit her at kristinbair.com, and follow her on the socials (@kbairokeeffe).

Our Readers:

Our Nonfiction Readers are Angelique Tung, Dolores Johnson, Donna Luff, Matthew Osment and Molly Howes. Our Fiction Readers are Marlene O'Brien, Deb Mead, Judy Kessler, Kristin Levy, Morgan McDaniel, Susie Svendsgaard, Joshua Shapiro and Cathy Elcik. Our Poetry Readers are Lisa Cantwell, Vincent Shiue, Heather Nelson, Cassidy Vogel, Hill Prater, Margaret Hanshaw, Margot Wizansky and Lisa Lee.

Our Interns:

In the past we've had wonderful interns from Oberlin College, Wellesley College, Emerson College, and elsewhere. If you're interested in interning for us, please get in touch!