Faces of NewLit: Ian S. Maloney—Jack Hazard Fellowship Program Director, Writer, and Educator

Profile by Giovanna Lomanto, NewLit Assistant Director

He keeps close the truth: that anyone and everyone can have a spark, a talent, that needs to grow.

Ian Maloney is a master of many trades. As the Jack Hazard Fellowship Program Director, his position at NewLit is multi-pronged: from outreach, to panel judging, to program management over the summer. But his talents don’t stop there. Ian is a two-time contributor to our published series, Simpsonistas: Tales from New Literary Project. His essays are gut-wrenching, truth-filled excavations of what it means to be a writer.

And Ian shares his knowledge with students on a daily basis. Dr. Ian S. Maloney is a professor of Literature, Writing, and Publishing at St. Francis College (Brooklyn) and simultaneously serves on the Literary Council of the Brooklyn Book Festival and committee member for Bookends, a citywide series leading up to the Festival day. He is also a Board Member for the Walt Whitman Initiative, and Executive Editor of The Arthur Miller Journal. Ian also ran the St. Francis College Prize, spearheading the contest and continuing to exercise his jurying chops in our 2022 Joyce Carol Oates Prize. The list of his achievements and positions feels more and more like a list from his latest essay (in Simpsonistas, Vol. 4), which states with a finality: “lists, ultimately, are how we learn what we lived for.”

And for Ian, his accomplishments revolve around passions, scholastic impulses, and, yes, writing. When asked about his path to writing, Ian credits his love for the craft to his uncle, Brother Owen Sadlier, who has been an educator for the past 50 years. His tagline to Ian and his sister: “Reading is key.” Despite Ian’s young age at the time of this enlightenment, Brother Owen pushed and inspired him to challenge the mind when it comes to reading, writing, and education.

Ian also describes the process of building community, both in the classroom and in the Jack Hazard Fellowship cohort as being something tangible, something that could be seen. People often gravitate to other people who are seeking to hone to their craft. "Carroll Street Collective,” a writing group Ian credits as his community in Brooklyn, “Academics should always strive to support community,” he says. His drive to connect nonprofits, small presses, and readers continues to endure and grow.

Ian sees his position as an educator as a way to nurture his students into something higher, something as great as their potential. He keeps close the truth: that anyone and everyone can have a spark, a talent, that needs to grow.

NewLit, to him, is a collaborative vision with great aspirations—to help people write their hearts out. Under the umbrella of this organization, Ian is inspired to tell great stories and find more people to continue doing so.

When asked, Ian’s cohort of Jack Hazard Fellows clambered to sing his praises. Of the many wonders that Ian has spotlighted in his time as the Jack Hazard Fellowship Director, Adam Davis highlights “the personal interest Ian took in my work and the enthusiasm he held for its future, not to mention the ways he sought to bring our cohort together.” Kevin Allardice seconded this, adding that “both Ian and New Literary Project have proven to be important champions of literature; perhaps more importantly, though, they've demonstrated an awareness of the challenges writers face in making art, and they have the energy and resources to help writers overcome those challenges. He has my gratitude.”

We want to amplify that gratitude to Ian for all the excellent work he has done for NewLit, the Jack Hazard Fellowship, and the diligence he possesses in his dedication to writing the world into a better, brighter future.