The Poetry Foundation and Poetry magazine have announced the recipients of the 2017 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowships. The annual awards are given to five U.S. poets between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-one. Each winner receives $25,800.

Ruth Lilly 2017 Fellows

(Photos from left: Fatimah Asghar, Sumita Chakraborty, Cortney Lamar Charleston, Roy G. Guzmán, Emily Jungmin Yoon)

This year’s fellows are Fatimah Asghar, Sumita Chakraborty, Cortney Lamar Charleston, Roy G. Guzmán and Emily Jungmin Yoon. Don Share, editor of Poetry magazine, said of the winners, “In a year during which some readers have asked ‘Why poetry?’ here are poets whose work not only provides a powerful answer, but demonstrates that the present—and future—of poetry have never been in such fine hands.”

Established in 1989 by Ruth Lilly, the fellowship program celebrates and encourages young poets to further their studies and writing of poetry. Visit the Poetry Foundation website for more information.

The campus novel is a work of fiction that revolves primarily around an academic campus, most often a college or university. Some fall into the category of coming-of-age stories, such as Jeffrey Eugenides’s The Marriage Plot and Elif Batuman’s The Idiot, while others are more focused on faculty, such as Mary McCarthy’s The Groves of Academe and Philip Roth’s The Human Stain. Campus novels offer the opportunity to explore characters within the hierarchical structures and pressurized environment of a closed educational system and the contrasting perspectives of teachers and students because of differences in age, power, class, and social and cultural values. Write a short story that focuses on students and/or teachers in a high school or college setting, perhaps integrating elements of comedy and satire like Kingsley Amis’s Lucky Jim and Jane Smiley’s Moo, science fiction like Jonathan Lethem’s As She Climbed Across the Table, murder mystery like Donna Tartt’s The Secret History, sports like Chad Harbach’s The Art of Fielding, or supernatural Gothic horror like Joyce Carol Oates’s The Accursed.

“Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, / Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— / While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping…” First published almost two hundred years ago, Edgar Allan Poe’s narrative poem “The Raven” was itself partially inspired by the raven in Charles Dickens’s novel Barnaby Rudge and has gone on to spark numerous renditions, homages, and parodies. And the poem’s influence has extended far beyond literature, giving a name to an NFL team (Baltimore Ravens) and providing inspiration for a range of artists, from cartoonists (The Simpsons and Calvin and Hobbes) to musicians (Lou Reed and the Grateful Dead). Write a poem that takes its cue from an element of Poe’s verse that you are especially drawn toward. Consider its themes of loss and devotion; the extensive use of alliteration and rhyme; the “nevermore” refrain; classical, mythological, and biblical references; the question-and-answer sequencing; the symbolism of the raven; or the forebodingly dark atmosphere.

In a New York Times review of three recently reissued books by English-born artist and author Leonora Carrington, Parul Sehgal describes Carrington’s habit of writing in rudimentary Spanish or French, an example of exophony, the practice of writing in a language that is not the writer’s native tongue. Sehgal also recounts Samuel Beckett, who after adopting French, stated in a letter: “More and more my own language appears to me like a veil that must be torn apart in order to get at the things (or the Nothingness) behind it.” Write a short essay about a particularly resonant memory. Then try rewriting the same memory either in another language, even if you only have a basic knowledge of it, or in a style of English that has been “torn apart” and defamiliarized. Do you find this practice freeing or limiting? Which elements of the memory and your storytelling are drastically altered, and what remains consistent throughout both versions?

In “How Deep This Grief: Wrestling With Writing as Therapy” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, Ian Stansel recounts not being able to write about his sister after her death, but realizing that he could write for her and try to write a book that she would love. Part of Stansel’s writing practice involves choosing someone he knows, often a family member, to stand in as the “ideal reader” that he keeps in mind while working on specific projects. Write a short story and use someone you know as an imagined ideal reader. Does having one specific person as your imagined reader inspire you to draw certain ideas, motifs, traits, or themes to the surface?

Bright blue hot springs ringed by yellow and orange. Red canyons, green auroras, cloud-white ice caves, golden sand dunes. Browse through National Geographic’s slideshow of some of the most colorful places on earth, many of them naturally occurring, and take in the sights. Then, write a poem that incorporates a variety of colors, hues, and shades found in nature. Allow the images and colors to guide your poem’s thematic direction, perhaps toward an expansive meditation of the outdoors, or toward memories or associations with people in your life.  

Prose writers, end your summer strong and submit to the following contests in fiction and nonfiction by Thursday, August 31. Each contest offers an award of at least $1,000 and publication.

Gemini Magazine Flash Fiction Contest: A prize of $1,000 and publication in Gemini Magazine is given annually for a short short story. Entry fee: $5

Glimmer Train Press Fiction Open: A prize of $3,000, publication in Glimmer Train Stories, and 20 copies of the prize issue is given twice yearly for a short story. A second-place prize of $1,000 is also given. Entry fee: $21

Glimmer Train Press Very Short Fiction Award: A prize of $2,000, publication in Glimmer Train Stories, and 20 copies of the prize issue is given twice yearly for a short short story. Entry fee: $16

Gulf Coast Barthelme Prize for Short Prose: A prize of $1,000 and publication in Gulf Coast is given annually for a piece of short prose. Roxane Gay will judge. Entry fee: $18

Gulf Coast Prize in Translation: A prize of $1,000 and publication in Gulf Coast is given for a prose excerpt translated from any language into English. John Keene will judge Entry fee: $18

New Guard Machigonne Fiction Contest: A prize of $1,500 each and publication in the New Guard is given annually for a short story. Chris Abani will judge. Entry fee: $20

Red Hen Press Quill Prose Award: A prize of $1,000 and publication by Red Hen Press is given annually for a short story collection, a novel, or an essay collection by a queer writer. Ryka Aoki will judge. Entry fee: $5

Snake Nation Press Serena McDonald Kennedy Award: A prize of $1,000 and publication by Snake Nation Press is given annually for a short story collection or a novella. Entry fee: $25

Sustainable Arts Foundation Writing Awards: Awards of $5,000 each are given annually to fiction writers and creative nonfiction writers with children. Writers with at least one child under the age of 18 are eligible. Entry fee: $15

Visit the contest websites for complete guidelines and submission details. Check out our Grants & Awards database and Submission Calendar for more upcoming contests in poetry, fiction, and nonfiction.

“First you live through the experience. Then you find out what it meant. Then you write.” Joyce Maynard’s essay “Patience and Memoir: The Time It Takes to Tell Your Story” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine emphasizes the importance of the passage of time and reflection as a vital part of the process of memoir writing. Write a memoiristic essay about an event or situation from your distant past. Was this a subtle experience that became more significant with time or an experience that instantly changed your life? What had to happen before you could gain enough distance for insights to be revealed? How might the meaning of this experience potentially continue to evolve in the future?