Fool for Poetry International Chapbook Competition 2018

Some people are fools for love, others are fools for poetry.

1st Prize: €1,000; 2nd Prize :€500
The winning poets are also offered a reading and three nights' accommodation at the Cork 2019 International Poetry Festival (March 27th-30th, 2019) (www.corkpoetryfest.net)

The competition is open to new, emerging and established poets from any country. One of these winners will be the highest scoring manuscript entered by a debutant poet with no solo collection (full-length or chapbook) previously published.
Up to 25 other entrants will be publicly listed as "highly commended". 
Manuscripts can be between 16 and 23 pages in length, in the English language and the sole work of the entrant with no pastiches, translations or 'versions'.
The poems can be in verse or prose.
There is an entrance fee of €25 for each manuscript.
Entrants may enter more than one manuscript.
The winners will be selected by a panel of renowned poets including Mary Noonan, Matthew Sweeney, Thomas McCarthy, James Harpur and Leanne O’Sullivan.
The winning chapbooks will be published by Southword editions in March 2019 and will be launched at the Cork International Poetry Festival (March 27-30, 2019). It will be offered for sale internationally through our own website and in selected independent book sellers.

Deadline: Saturday 30th of June, Midnight
Link here 

Both winners will win a chapbook publication and 50 complimentary copies. The published chapbooks will be reviewed in Southword Journal and elsewhere.

The North – Irish Issue

Deadline: 30 Jul 2018

Issue 61 of The North, to be published in December 2018, will be a special Irish issue, edited by poets Jane Clarke and Nessa O’Mahony. It will focus on work by poets living on the island of Ireland, or who are from Ireland but living elsewhere. 

There is no set theme for submissions, but the editors are interested in contemporary poems reflecting the cultural diversity of life in Ireland in the 21st century, and particularly welcome submissions from poets from minority communities.

Send up to four unpublished poems to thenorthirishissue@gmail.com as a word attachment and cut and past it into the body of the email. Please make sure to put your name, postal address and email address on every sheet.

The editors also intend to include reviews of collections by Irish poets published between January 2017 and end April 2018. We welcome review copies – please email thenorthirishissue@gmail.com for address.

Bread and Roses Poetry Award

Culture Matters is pleased to announce that the second Bread and Roses Poetry Award, sponsored by Unite, is now open for entries. It is part of our mission to promote a socialist approach to culture. The purpose of the Award is to create new opportunities for working class people to write poetry, and encourage poets to focus on themes which are meaningful to working class people and communities.

Submission Guidelines and Award Rules

1. You may enter up to three original, previously unpublished poems in English, each no more than 50 lines long.

2. You must be resident in the United Kingdom or Republic of Ireland.

3. Entry is free, and open to anyone regardless of trade union membership.

4. There will be five prizes of £100 each.

5. Entries should broadly deal with themes relevant to working class life, politics, communities and culture.

6. Entries should be sent to info@culturematters.org.uk by midnight on Friday 8 June, or by post to Culture Matters, c/o 8 Moore Court, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE15 8QE, to arrive on Friday 8 June. No entries will be accepted after that date.

Winners will be invited to an award ceremony in Durham on 13 July, linked to the Durham Miners’ Gala, with travel and accommodation costs paid. The best poems will be published in an anthology later in 2018.

Copies of the Bread and Roses Poetry Anthology 2017 are available to buy here.

Wigtown Poetry Competition

The competition closes on 8 June, with a prize-giving at Wigtown Book Festival (21-30 September 2018).  

Canterbury Festival Poet of the Year Competition

This is the 12^th year of the Competition, which is widely respected and forms a major part of the Festival year.   

From the entries received about 35 poems are chosen for the long list and these are published in an anthology; copies are available from the Festival Office.  A shortlist of poems is then selected and from these the winners are chosen.  

The Competition is generously supported by the School of English at the University of Kent who donate the University of Kent Prize of £200 for the winner, £100 for second and £50 for third places, £25 for the People’s Choice and the Best-Read Poem receives a bottle of sparkling wine courtesy of the Wine Room, Tankerton.  

So send in your poems of all types, long, short, tragic, funny, whatever you are moved to write and you may find yourself crowned the Canterbury Festival Poet of the Year 2018.

The Competition deadline is Monday 18 June 2018.  

The fee for entry is £5 per poem and please don’t forget to attach an entry form which can be downloaded here.  

The poem or poem sequence may be on any subject and in any style but must not exceed 60 lines in length excluding title and line breaks.  

Entries are judged anonymously 

The Terms and Conditions can be downloaded here. 

McLellan Poetry Prize

Part of the McLellan Festival 31st August - 9th September 2018

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This year's judge is Sinéad Morrissey.

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 1st prize £1500     2nd prize £300     3rd prize £150

6 commendations of £25

The competition closing date is 21st June 2018

Fee £6 for the first poem and £5 for each subsequent poem submitted on the same form.

Poems should be of no more than 80 lines (excluding title), in English and your own original work (no translations).

Link here

Bridport Prizes

This is one of the most prestigious writing contests in the British literary calendar.

Do you have a really good poem or short story? Or a few? I mean, really REALLY good?

• poem - no more than 42 lines
• short story - no more than 5,000 words.   
• flash fiction category - stories of up to 250 words 
• First Novel - 5,000 to 8,000 words

This year’s judges are Daljit Nagra, & (poems) Monica Ali (flash fiction and short stories) and Kamila Shamsie (First novel).

    Closing: 31st May (postmarked)

Prizes: 

In each of the main categories (Short Stories, Poems) - £5,000, £1,000, £500.  There are also ten runners-up prizes of £100.  These are called ‘supplementary prizes’ to make you feel less like an also-ran.  The top four poems will be submitted to the Forward Prize. 

Prizes in the Flash Fiction category are £1,000, £500, £250, plus three supplementary awards of £100.

Note: Entries must never have been published, self-published, published on any website, blog or online forum, broadcast nor winning or placed in any other competition.

    Entry Fees have increased:Poems - £9.  Short Stories - £10.  Flash Fiction - £8, Novel - £20
 
    Comp Page: Click Here.