Find the Music

The Time Is Now
9.13.22

In this week’s installment of our Craft Capsule series, Gregory Orr writes about the use of sounds and sound patterns in poems to produce a textural sonic experience. The essay begins by discussing four lines from Theodore Roethke’s poem “Root Cellar,” which Orr uses to exemplify how sound can “create a dense composition that is the sonic equivalent of intense odors and textures.” This week write a poem that illustrates through sound the smells, noises, and tactile experiences of a place from your childhood. Follow Orr’s advice to find what brings you pleasure in the music of words and use it in your poem.

Upcoming Contest Deadlines

G&A: The Contest Blog
9.9.22

With fall fast approaching, kickstart the new season by submitting to contests with a deadline of September 30. Prizes abound for writers of supernatural fiction, hybrid poetry collections, essays, translations, poems evoking the American South, and more. Awards range from $1,000 to $75,000, and two contests are even free to enter. May the autumnal equinox be in your favor!

Diode Editions
Poetry Book Contest
A prize of $1,500, publication by Diode Editions, and 20 author copies is given annually for a poetry collection. The winner will also have select poems from their book published in Diode Poetry Journal. Hybrid words, prose poetry, translations, and collaborative works are eligible. Entry fee: $20.

Dzanc Books
Short Story Collection Prize
A prize of $2,500 and publication by Dzanc Books is given annually for a story collection. The editors will judge. Entry fee: $25.

Ghost Story
Supernatural Fiction Award
A prize of $1,500, publication on the Ghost Story website and in the Ghost Story print anthology series, 21st Century Ghost Stories, is given twice yearly for a short story with a supernatural or magic realism theme. The editors will judge. Entry fee: $20.

Lascaux Review
Prize in Creative Nonfiction
A prize of $1,000 is given annually for an essay. The winner and finalists will also be published on the Lascaux Review website and in the journal’s print annual. Previously published and unpublished essays are eligible. All entries are considered for publication. Entry fee: $15.

New York Public Library
Cullman Center Fellowships
Fifteen fellowships are given annually to artists, academics, and creative writers, including poets, fiction writers, creative nonfiction writers, and translators, whose work will benefit directly from access to the research collections at the New York Public Library. The fellows each receive $75,000, an office at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library’s main branch in the Midtown neighborhood of Manhattan, and full access to the library’s collections from September 2023 through May 2024. Fellows will be required to work on their projects at the Cullman Center for the duration of the fellowship. Writers currently enrolled in a graduate degree-granting program are ineligible. Entry fee: none.

Texas Review Press
X. J. Kennedy Poetry Prize
A prize of $10,000, publication by Texas Review Press, and 20 author copies will be given annually for a poetry collection. Kimiko Hahn will judge. Entry fee: $28.

Texas Review Press
George Garrett Fiction Prize
A prize of $1,000, publication by Texas Review Press, and 20 author copies will be given annually for a short story collection or novel. Vi Khi Nao will judge. Entry fee: $28.

University of Arkansas Press
Miller Williams Poetry Prize
A prize of $5,000 and publication by University of Arkansas Press is given annually for a poetry collection. Patricia Smith will judge. Entry fee: $28.

University of Mississippi
Willie Morris Award for Southern Poetry
A prize of $3,000 is given annually for a single poem that evokes the American South. The winner will also receive an all-expenses-paid trip to Oxford, Mississippi, for the awards ceremony in March 2023. Susan Kinsolving will judge. Entry fee: none. 

Winning Writers
Tom Howard/Margaret Reid Poetry Contest
Two prizes of $3,000 each, two-year gift certificates for membership to the literary database Duotrope, and publication on the Winning Writers website are given annually for a poem in any style and a poem that either rhymes or is written in a traditional style. Soma Mei Sheng Frazier and Michal “MJ” Jones will judge. Entry fee: $20.

Visit the contest websites for complete guidelines, and check out the Grants & Awards database and Submission Calendar for more contests in poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and translation.

Accidental Sounds

The Time Is Now
9.8.22

On August 29, 1952, American composer and music theorist John Cage premiered his most famous and controversial piece 4’33”, a three-movement piece written for any instrument or combination of instruments in which the score instructs silence for four minutes and thirty-three seconds. In an interview that appears in Richard Kostelanetz’s 1988 book Conversing With Cage, Cage says of the audience for this first performance: “There’s no such thing as silence. What they thought was silence, because they didn’t know how to listen, was full of accidental sounds. You could hear the wind stirring outside during the first movement.” Write an essay inspired by this iconic piece of music. Try listening to the natural and ambient sounds of your writing environment and explore the moments in your life in which silence has been meaningful.

World Heritage Sites

The Time Is Now
9.7.22

This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the first United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Convention, in which natural and cultural sites around the world are considered and added to a list to protect and preserve their heritage. There are currently over one thousand legally protected sites, which include the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, Mount Fuji in Japan, Canaima National Park in Venezuela, and Victoria Falls in Zambia. Explore the UNESCO World Heritage list and write a story that takes place at one of these protected sites. Read through the site’s history for ideas on how to weave this setting into your story.

Start With Loss

The Time Is Now
9.6.22

“Start with loss. Lose everything. Then lose it all again,” writes John Murillo in his poem “Variations on a Theme by Elizabeth Bishop,” which appears in his collection Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry (Four Way Books, 2020), in which he directly quotes from and expands upon Elizabeth Bishop’s poem “One Art.” Using his own perspective, Murillo explores the theme of loss and uses intimate life details to make each event feel distinct, sometimes measuring one against the other as Bishop does in her poem. He writes: “Measure a father’s coffin against a cousin’s / crashing T-cells. Kiss your sister through prison glass.” This week, write a poem that directly responds to a favorite poem of yours. Try writing a variation of a line or directly quoting from the poem to get started.

Deadline Nears for Diode Editions’ Poetry Book Contest

G&A: The Contest Blog
9.2.22

There is still time to submit to Diode Editions’ poetry book contest! Offered annually for a full-length manuscript, the competition awards the winner with a prize of $1,500, publication by Diode Editions, and 20 author copies of the published collection. The winner will also have select poems from their book published in Diode Poetry Journal.

To submit, e-mail a manuscript of 55 to 100 pages to Diode Editions with a receipt of payment of the $20 reading fee by September 30. Hybrid works, prose poetry, translations, and collaborative works are eligible. Visit the website for complete guidelines.

An independent press based in Doha, Qatar, and Richmond, Virginia, Diode Editions was founded by editor in chief Patty Paine in 2012 as an extension of Diode Poetry Journal. The press publishes full-length poetry collections, chapbooks, and poetry-related nonfiction works. Diode’s mission is “to beautifully craft our books, and to fanatically support our authors.”

Find a Writing Contest

The Grants & Awards database includes details about every writing contest we’ve published in Poets & Writers Magazine during the past year. We carefully review the practices and policies of each contest before including it, making the Grants & Awards database the most trusted resource for legitimate writing contests available anywhere.

Search the database

In Three Hundred Words

The Time Is Now
9.1.22

In the anthology Nonwhite and Woman: 131 Micro Essays on Being in the World (Woodhall Press, 2022) edited by Darien Hsu Gee and Carla Crujido, which is featured in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, writers express the many facets of being a woman of color in poems and essays, all of which are three hundred words or less. The pieces navigate topics ranging from immigration, colorism, and financial struggles to family, food, and friendship. Inspired by these themes, write a micro essay that illustrates how your identity affects the way you move in the world. What creative approaches will you use to compress your thoughts into three hundred words or less?

Awkward Words

The Time Is Now
8.31.22

In a recent thread on Twitter, author Rebecca Makkai begins a discussion on words that make prose awkward in fiction, starting with the use of “as” in a sentence such as: “‘Hey there,’ I said as I got up as I turned on the lights.’” Other awkward words Makkai lists include “temporal hinge words” like “after” and “while,” the overuse of “that” in a sentence, and the use of gerunds, especially as dialogue modifiers. The last tip Makkai offers is a useful one: “I promise you, if you control + F through your work just on the words ‘as’ and ‘that’ and take out 90% of them, you’ll be so happy.” Try using this advice to revise a draft of a short story you’re working on. Remove some of the narrative devices listed in Makkai’s tweets and see how the rhythm of your story’s language changes.

Skew Dice

The Time Is Now
8.30.22

“Up late scrolling / for distraction, love, hope, / I discovered skew dice. // In the promotional video / you see only a mathematician’s hands, / like the hands of god,” writes Catherine Barnett in “2020,” a poem published in the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series. As a way of illustrating the loneliness felt during the early days of the pandemic, the poem focuses on the central image of skew dice, a set of irregularly shaped dice that are mirror images of each other. Write a poem that revolves around one central object. Try to be detailed about its uses and origins. Let the poem guide what the image of this object represents for you.

Upcoming Contest Deadlines

G&A: The Contest Blog
8.26.22

August may be coming to an end, but September presents a new chance to get a little love—and money—for your writing: Submit to contests with deadlines of September 5, 8, 15, 16, and 26! Among the prizes are $78,000 fellowships from Harvard University, $50,000 fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, publication of a poetry collection and chapbook, and awards for individual poems, essays, and stories. All contests offer a cash prize of $1,000 or more, and two are free to enter. Good luck, writers!

Coffee-House Poetry
Troubadour International Poetry Prize
A prize of £2,000 (approximately $2,507) is given annually for a single poem. A second-place prize of £1,000 (approximately $1,254) is also given. Both winners receive publication on the Coffee-House Poetry website and an invitation to read alongside the contest judges at a celebration on December 5. Joshua Bennett and Victoria Kennefick will judge. Deadline: September 26. Entry fee: $7.

Dogwood
Literary Awards
Three prizes of $1,000 each and publication in Dogwood are given annually for a poem, a short story, and an essay. Finalists are chosen by the editorial staff and accepted for publication; winners are then chosen from the finalist pool by a guest judge. All entries are considered for publicaton. Deadline: September 5. Entry fee: $12.

Finishing Line Press
New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition
A prize of $1,500 and publication by Finishing Line Press is given annually for a poetry chapbook by a writer who identifies as a woman and has not yet published a full-length collection. Leah Huete de Maines will judge. All entries are considered for publication. Deadline: September 15. Entry Fee: $20.

Harvard University
Radcliffe Institute Fellowships
Fellowships of $78,000 each, office space at the Radcliffe Institute, and access to the libraries at Harvard University are given annually to poets, fiction writers, and creative nonfiction writers to allow them to pursue creative projects. Writers also receive $5,000 to cover project expenses. Deadline: September 8. Entry Fee: none.

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
Writing Fellowships
Fellowships of approximately $50,000 each are awarded annually to poets, fiction writers, and creative nonfiction writers on the basis of “exceptional creative ability.” Citizens and permanent residents of the United States and Canada with a “significant and appropriate record” of publication are eligible. Deadline: September 16. Entry fee: none.

Lightscatter Press
Poetry Prize
A prize of $1,000, 25 author copies, and multimodal publication by Lightscatter Press will be given annually for a poetry collection written by an emerging writer. Hybrid works and multilingual texts which combine English with another language are eligible. Rick Barot will judge. Deadline: September 15. Entry fee: $30.

The Moth
Nature Writing Prize
A prize of €1,000 (approximately $1,089) and publication in the Moth is given annually for a poem, story, or essay that features “an exploration of the writer’s relationship with the natural world.” The winner also receives a weeklong stay at the Circle of Misse artist’s retreat in Missé, France. Max Porter will judge. Deadline: September 15. Entry Fee: $15.

Visit the contest websites for complete guidelines, and check out the Grants & Awards database and Submission Calendar for more contests in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.

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