Uncommon Contests: Nineteen Literary Awards With Prizes Beyond the Ordinary
A look at contests that, in addition to cash prizes, award residencies, retreats, and introductions to agents, among other unique opportunities.
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Article Archive: Special Section
Articles from Poet & Writers Magazine include material from the print edition plus exclusive online-only material.
A Former Pollyanna Learns the Value of Critical Feedback
After experiencing a writers group that only delivered praise, the author realizes the value of constructive feedback and offers guidance on how best to give it.
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Reenvisioning the Writers Group
The author suggests writers group options that depart from the typical workshop model, such as freewriting, responding to prompts, and reading together.
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A Practical Guide to Starting a Group of Your Own
The novelist and teacher offers advice on starting a writers group where your creative work can thrive.
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The Many Different Kinds of Writers Groups
A look at the ways writers can benefit from distinctly different kinds of gatherings, including groups offering accountability partners, workshop feedback, and publishing advice.
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The Perfectly Balanced Writers Group
The author’s failed attempts to find a writers group eventually lead her to build one of her own that offers the right mix of rigor and support.
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A Freeing Space: Our Seventeenth Annual Look at Debut Poets
Ten debut poets who published in 2021, including Threa Almontaser and Shangyang Fang, discuss the inspiration for their books, their writers block remedies, and advice for other poets.
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How to Keep Going
The author recalls being pregnant in the early days of the pandemic and asks: How we can continue to create in times of uncertainty?
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We Build It Ourselves: A Roundtable on Race, Power, and the Writing Workshop
Felicia Rose Chavez, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and Matthew Salesses join Namrata Poddar to discuss decolonizing the writing workshop and the effects of gatekeeping on BIPOC writers.
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Pandemic Writers Group: Finding Creativity, Community, and Play
The novelist and essayist shares her experience creating a virtual writers group focused on play, and muses on the meaning of productivity and artistic friendship during the pandemic.
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A Life in Poetry: Our Sixteenth Annual Look at Debut Poets
Ten poets whose first books were published in 2020, including Anthony Cody and torrin a. greathouse, share their inspirations, processes, writer’s block remedies, and paths to publication.
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The Politics of Gatekeeping: On Reconsidering the Ethics of Blind Submissions
A writer and editor questions the practice of blind submissions at literary journals as an additional barrier against equity in publishing, and makes the case for diversifying editorial mastheads.
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Return to the MFA: A Call for Systemic Change in the Literary Arts
The author considers how race is discussed in MFA versus literature PhD programs and argues that the MFA—and the literary culture and community it props up—is due for a reevaluation.
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We Need New Metaphors: Reimagining Power in the Creative Writing Workshop
The author describes creating a community-driven workshop where students are not asked to check their politics and identities at the door, and offers a series of questions for instructors to ask themselves before leading a class.
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Agents for Poets: An Investigation
An in-depth look into whether the number of poets represented by literary agents is on the rise, and how agents help poets achieve their career goals.
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Open the Book
Artist Diane Samuels turns works of literature inside out in a dramatic process of creative rewriting that highlights the intimate relationship between writer and reader in a painstaking homage to the ultimate act of creativity: writing.
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Poetic Lenses: Our Fifteenth Annual Look at Debut Poetry
Ten debut poets published in 2019, including Camonghne Felix and Jake Skeets, share their advice, inspiration, and path to publication.
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Four Lunches and a Breakfast: What I Learned About the Book Business While Breaking Bread With Five Hungry Agents
An in-depth look at book publishing as seen through the eyes of five literary agents.
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Twenty-Two of the Most Inspiring Writers Retreats in the Country
Twenty-two writers, including Alexander Chee and Rebecca Makkai, offer their personal take on the best retreats for productivity, motivation, networking, and more.
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Top Ten Retreats for Emerging Writers
Ten of the best retreats, workshop programs, conferences, and festivals for emerging writers across the country.
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Wilder Forms: Our Fourteenth Annual Look at Debut Poets
Ten poets whose first books were published in 2018, including Justin Phillip Reed and Tiana Clark, share their inspirations, processes, writer’s block remedies, and paths to publication.
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The Boat We Are Building: A New MFA Program Makes Diversity Its Mission
A new low-residency MFA program makes diversity its mission.
2019 MFA Index: Your Guide to More Than 220 Programs
A guide to 158 full-residency and 64 low-residency programs in creative writing, plus questions to consider before you apply.
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MFA in Mind: Twenty Questions to Ask Before Applying
Why do you want an MFA? Important questions to ask yourself before you apply.
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The Business of Relationships: How Authors, Agents, Editors, Booksellers, and Publicists Work Together to Reach Readers
The teams behind debut authors Jordy Rosenberg, Nafissa Thompson-Spires, Aja Gabel, Rachel Z. Arndt, and Ruth Joffre.
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