2009 Pinewood Haiku Contest1st Place - $100, 2nd Place - $50, 3rd Place - $25 Winners published in April 2009 issue of Wisteria. Entry fee = $ 2.00 -- per poem or 3 poems for $5. Maximum of 3 poems may be entered. Cash or money orders only. No checks accepted. Money Orders should be made payable to: T.A. Thompson
Any topic, form = Contemporary English-language haiku with no rules as to syllable or line count. See website for specific info on how to submit and address to mail submissions. No previously published works accepted. No email entries. Winners notified by email and postal mail. No SASE necessary.
http://pinewoodhaik u.blogspot. com
Deadline: Feb. 14, 2009
Firstwriter. com's Fifth International Short Story Contest.
This competition is open to fiction in any style and on any subject under 3,000 words long. The prize-money for first place is £200 (over $300). Ten special commendations will also be awarded and all the winners will be published in firstwriter. magazine and receive a subscription voucher to the site worth $30 / £20 / €30! The contest is open to stories of any style and on any subject, but they must not be longer than 3,000 words.
The closing date for submissions is April 1, 2009, and there is a reading fee of $9.75 / £6.50 per story. Alternatively you can enter two stories for just $8.63 / £5.75 each, three stories for only $7.50 / £5.00 each, or five stories for only $6.00 / £4.00 per story.
http://tinyurl. com/3vbzus
Deadline: April 1, 2009
Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry Contest -
No Fee to enter. 8th annual free contest with a special twist. Fifteen cash prizes totaling $3,336.40. Top prize $1,359. Submit one poem by April 1 deadline. No entry fee. Winning entries published online. Judge: Jendi Reiter. Sponsored by Winning Writers. Guidelines and online submission at www.winningwriters. com/wergle
Deadline: April 1, 2009
Skysaje Enterprzes Fifth Annual Poetry Contest -
Guidelines are: 1. all submissions must be typed in 14 pts font, 2. authors name and contact info must appear on every page submitted, 3. submit no more than five (5) poems per entry, and 4. a $15.00 non refundable entry fee must accompany all submissions. Prizes: $250 us. first prize and three $25 us. honorable mentions will be awarded. Make checks payable to L.Berger and send your entries to:
Skysaje Enterprizes
50 Amesbury Rd.
Rochester, NY 14623
Deadline: April 30, 2009
Margaret Reid Poetry Contest for Traditional Verse
In its sixth year, this contest seeks poetry in traditional verse forms such as sonnets and free verse. Both published and unpublished poems are welcome. Prizes of $2,000, $1,000, $500 and $250 will be awarded, plus five High Distinction awards of $200 each and six Most Highly Commended Awards of $100 each. The entry fee is $7 for every 25 lines you submit.
Submit online or by mail. Early submission encouraged. This contest is sponsored by Tom Howard Books and assisted by Winning Writers. Judges: John H. Reid and Dee C. Konrad.
http://www.winningw riters.com/ contests/ margaret/ ma_guidelines. php
Deadline: June 30, 2009
6 comments:
I am undoubtably an outlier here, but I've always considered contests with entry fees to be very suspect. I know it's getting to be ubiquitous in the poetry field, but when a press starts subsidizing themselves by making the writers pay to play, my thinking is, that press probably ought to rethink their reason for existing anyway.
And, it's always important to verify that they have a Jorie Graham rule, or some kind of no-conflict-of-interest policy, in place.
...with that said, the Wergle Flomp contest (which, by the way, has no entry fee) is a hoot. The correct URL for the rules is here, and last year's winner are here (in fact, last year's winner mentions Cleveland! Yes!).
I guess I should say something like we here at Clevelandpoetics are putting these links to contests up as a service and as always – buyer beware. The source I used to get these listings is a reputable one and I do not think there is any hanky-panky going on with the short list posted.
One the other hand, I would like to adamantly suggest that every writer take a little time to do a bit of a background check on any organization before sending them your money. There are plenty of less than credible outfits out there who are happy to take your money and provide nothing in return.
Sites like Poetry.com for example who are quite happy to publish any garbage sent their way and then fleecing the submitters of cash to buy the telephone sized book of sludge in which their “accepted piece” has been included. (I defy anyone to write a poem bad enough that poetry.com will not accept it. In fact, send them your worst and then send me their acceptance letter with the terrible poem and I will publish them both here on Clevelandpoetics the Blog.)
Contests on the other hand are sometimes the lifeblood of a small publishing house. Most require an entry fee of some sort. Usually an entrant gets a copy of the publication and there is some sort of cash prize associated with winning the thing. There is a difference between paying an entry fee for a contest and paying to have your words set in print with no vetting. Just about all academic literary presses would be out of business without some sort of subsidy beyond sales of their publications. Small presses outside of academic revenue stream have an even tougher task.
I know that in a perfect world small literary presses would thrive on reader’s subscriptions and they would be able to pay you big bucks to publish your latest verse. This just isn’t the case. So, do your homework, check the outfit out before you write that check. And, if you are opposed to paying to play, most of these places have regular submission routes to their publications as well that won’t cost you a dime.
michael salinger said...
"I defy anyone to write a poem bad enough that poetry.com will not accept it. In fact, send them your worst and then send me their acceptance letter with the terrible poem and I will publish them both here on Clevelandpoetics the Blog."
Better yet, send them an awful poem, and then send the poem to the Wergle Flomp contest!
I have to admit I had a poem published in one of those encyclopedic volumes twenty-or-so years ago. Maybe one day I'll find the courage to share it with the 21st century masses. One thing that amuses me: going through that mammoth book for the first time in ages today, I notice that some of my online poet friends (who I won't embarrass here) have poems in it as well. Mwahahaha!
John,
No worries. I'm in one somewhere, too. There are many folks who have been suckered in by that contest. I know many of my friends from high school and college were "published" in those "anthologies." You are not alone.
Michael (and everyone else interested in poetry.com rejection),
Check out this site:
http://www.postfoetry.com/2007/08/poetry-dot-com-rejection-letter.html
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