Manchester Metropolitan University has opened its second biennial poetry competition, which carries a prize of ten thousand pounds (approximately fifteen thousand dollars). Poets writing in English, regardless of nationality, are invited to submit a portfolio of three to five poems totaling no more than 120 lines by August 6.

This year's judges are Simon Armitage (Seeing Stars, Zoom!), Lavinia Greenlaw (Minsk, Thoughs of a Night Sea), and Daljit Nagra (Look We Have Coming to Dover!), who have all been recognized by the prestigious Forward Poetry Prize as winners or finalists.

The 2008 judges, Gillian Clarke, Imtiaz Dharker, and Carol Ann Duffy, chose two winners to share the inaugural prize, Lesley Saunders and Mandy Coe, both of England. Coe is the author of two collections, most recently The Weight of Cows (Shoestring Press, 2004), and Saunders the author of four, including No Doves (Mulfran Press, 2010).

The poetry award alternates annually with an award in fiction. English fiction writer Toby Litt, author of ten novels, won the first fiction prize in 2009.

Poetry entries, which should be accompanied by a fifteen pound fee, can be made online or via postal mail. Guidelines and contact information for the university are available on the school's Web site.

In the video below, 2010 judge Armitage reads at the most recent Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival.

The second annual Cave Canem Northwestern University Press Poetry Prize winner has been announced.

Detroit-based poet and Cave Canem fellowship recipient Vievee Francis received the award for her second poetry collection, Horse in the Dark, selected by Parneshia Jones and Adrian Matejka.

Francis, a 2009 Rona Jaffe Foundation prize winner and graduate of the MFA program at the University of Michigan, is also the author of the collection Blue-Tail Fly (Wayne
State University Press, 2006). Horse in the Dark will be published by Northwestern University Press in March 2011.

The prize, established in 2008, is given for a second poetry collection by an African American writer. The inaugural winner was Indigo Moor for Through the Stonecutter's Window.

To hear a selection of recordings of Francis reading her poems, as well as her words on a humanitarian poetry project, the pleasure of writing, and poets she recommends reading, visit her archive page at From the Fishhouse.

The Munster Literature Centre in Cork, Ireland, named five U.S. writers finalists for the most lucrative prize in short fiction, the Frank O'Connor Short Story Award. American authors Robin Black, Belle Boggs (one of Poets & Writers Magazine's featured debut fiction authors in the July/August 2010 issue), T. C. Boyle, Ron Rash, and Laura van den Berg were shortlisted for the thirty-five-thousand-euro prize (approximately $45,000) along with David Constantine of Oxford, England.

Debut authors make up half of the finalists, with Black shortlisted for If I Loved You, I Would Tell You This (Random House), Boggs for Mattaponi Queen (Graywolf Press), and van den Berg for What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us (Dzanc Books). Boyle is a finalist for Wild Child (Viking), Rash for Burning Bright (HarperCollins), and Constantine for The Shieling (Comma Press). Three of the finalists' publishers are small presses—Graywolf Press, Dzanc Books, and Comma Press.

The annual award recognizes a book of short stories written in English and published in the twelve months preceding the September award announcement, made with all finalists in attendance at the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Festival. Last year's winner was Simon van Booy of Wales for his second collection Love Begins in Winter (Beautiful Books).

The 2010 judges are novelist Mary Morrissy; Nadine O'Regan, books and arts editor for the Sunday Business Post; and Diana Reich, a former Orange Prize administrator and the founder of the Small Wonder short story festival in Sussex, England.

In the video below, van den Berg reads from her debut collection, the manuscript for which won the 2007 Dzanc Prize.