In this video, George Takei, honorary chair of Banned Books Week 2025, talks about how “access to books and knowledge is essential to democracy” and how reading provides a way to see ourselves reflected in stories and to discover the stories of others. To learn more, visit the Banned Books Week website.
Find details about every creative writing competition—including poetry contests, short story competitions, essay contests, awards for novels, grants for translators, and more—that we’ve published in the Grants & Awards section of Poets & Writers Magazine during the past year. We carefully review the practices and policies of each contest before including it in the Writing Contests database, the most trusted resource for legitimate writing contests available anywhere.