JENNIFER BARTLETT was born in the San Francisco Bay Area and educated at the University of New Mexico, Vermont College and Brooklyn College. She is a retired adjunct lecturer in First-Year Writing. Bartlett is the author of four poetry books, Derivative of the Moving Image, (a) lullaby without any music, Autobiography/Anti-Autobiography and Hindrances of a Householder. She also co-edited Beauty is a Verb: The New Poetry of Disability with Sheila Black and Michael Northen. Her latest book is a biography on the Black Mountain poet, Larry Eigner, Sustaining Air: The Life of Larry Eigner (University of Alabama Press, 2023). Bartlett was an advisor for The New York Times Disability blog, where she published two opinion pieces and curated the Times first selection of poetry.
As a disability justice activist, she co-founded the Elevator Action Group—which advocates for accessibility on New York City subways and buses. From 2019-2021, she worked in the Office of the President for NYC Transit (under Andy Byford) in the Systemwide Accessibility Office. Bartlett has received fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts, Fund for Poetry, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, the Gloucester Writing Center and the Dodd Research Center at the University of Connecticut. Bartlett currently lives in Laugarvatn, Iceland, where she writes and studies Icelandic as a Second Language.
