Joel Calahan was born in 1982 in Omaha, Nebraska, and grew up in Minneapolis and Phoenix. He studied at Pomona College and the University of Chicago, where he received a PhD in comparative literature in 2016. He served on the editorial staff of Chicago Review starting in 2005, and as co-editor from 2010 to 2014. His translations of contemporary Italian poetry have been published widely in journals and anthologies. He lives in San Diego, CA, with his wife and four boys.