Marvin Bell to Judge Debut Book Prize

The Academy of American Poets announced yesterday that poet Marvin Bell will judge the 2010 Walt Whitman Award, given for a first poetry collection. Bell's debut collection, published in 1966 by Stone Wall Press, is Things We Dreamt We Died For, and his most recent book is 7 Poets, 4 Days, 1 Book (Trinity University Press, 2009), a collaborative project with six other writers.

The winner of the Whitman Award, which will open for entries on September 15, will receive a prize of five thousand dollars, publication of his or her winning manuscript by Louisiana State University Press, and a monthlong residency at the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson. Writers who have not published a poetry collection in a standard edition—that is, a book of forty pages or more in length that was released in an edition of five hundred copies or more—may submit a manuscript of fifty to one hundred pages between September 15 and November 15 with a twenty-five-dollar entry fee. Poets who have published chapbooks or books in limited editions still eligible. An entry form and complete guidelines are available on the Academy Web site.

The winner is expected to be announced in May 2010. Last year's award, judged by Juan Felipe Herrera, was given to J. Michael Martinez of Boulder, Colorado, for his debut collection, Heredities, which will be published next spring.

To read a selection of poems by Bell, and to link to an interview with him conducted by Rebecca Seiferle, visit the Academy's Web page on the poet.