Writers-in-Progress

Governor's Recitation and Baltimore Screenwriting Competition

I was at the Governor's press conference this morning in Annapolis announcing the Poet Laureate search committee chair (Alice McDermott, who gave a very nice speech about poetry, for a fiction writer!), and we were treated to the unexpected pleasure of the Governor himself reciting a poem: On Raglan Road by Patrick Kavanagh, which I'll share here. He did a good job:

On Raglan Road on an autumn day I met her first and knew
That her dark hair would weave a snare that I might one day rue;
I saw the danger, yet I walked along the enchanted way,
And I said, let grief be a fallen leaf at the dawning of the day.
On Grafton Street in November we tripped lightly along the ledge
Of the deep ravine where can be seen the worth of passion's pledge,
The Queen of Hearts still making tarts and I not making hay
O I loved too much and by such by such is happiness thrown away.
I gave her gifts of the mind I gave her the secret sign that's known
To the artists who have known the true gods of sound and stone
And word and tint. I did not stint for I gave her poems to say.
With her own name there and her own dark hair like clouds over fields of May
On a quiet street where old ghosts meet I see her walking now
Away from me so hurriedly my reason must allow
That I had wooed not as I should a creature made of clay -
When the angel woos the clay he'd lose his wings at the dawn of day.

NOW FOR THE BALTIMORE SCREENWRITING COMPETITION INFO:
For media inquiries only
October 9, 2008 contact: Tracy Baskerville
Dionne McConkey
410-752-8632

THE 4TH ANNUAL BALTIMORE SCREENWRITERS COMPETITION
EARLY SUBMISSION DEADLINE: Friday, November 21, 2008
FINAL DEADLINE: Friday, January 9, 2009

The Baltimore Film Office at the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts, in conjunction with Morgan State University’s Film and Television Writing Program and Johns Hopkins’ Film and Media Studies Program, is seeking aspiring film writers for the fourth annual Baltimore Screenwriters Competition. The competition is designed to create awareness of screenplay as a literary art form and to encourage new screenwriters into the entertainment industry. The early submission deadline is Friday, November 21, 2008 with a $35 application fee, and the final deadline is Friday, January 9, 2009 with a $50 application fee.

Interested writers can submit applications and original feature length screenplays that must be set in or can be filmed in Baltimore. Materials can be mailed or delivered to the Baltimore Screenwriters Competition, Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts, 7 East Redwood Street, Suite 500, Baltimore, Maryland 21202. The Screenwriting Competition is project of Mayor Sheila Dixon and the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts’ Division of Film, Video and Television and sponsored by Municipal Employees Credit Union of Baltimore (MECU), Maryland Film Festival, Baltimore Theatre Alliance, Baltimore Area Convention and Visitors Association and the Creative Alliance at the Patterson.

All eligible scripts will receive coverage by local screenwriters, and final scripts will be judged by film industry professionals. Participating judges will be announced at a later date. Winning prizes include cash and all access passes to the Maryland Film Festival.

To download the Baltimore Screenwriters Competition application, visit www.baltimorefilm.com or call 410-752-8632.

MD State Individual Artist Fellowships

The 2009 Maryland State Fellowship guidelines and applications are now available. The funding categories available for 2009 include:

Dance: Choreography
Music Composition (World, Classical and Non Classical)
Playwriting
Poetry
Visual Arts: Crafts
Visual Arts: Photography
Visual Arts: Sculpture

All applications must be submitted online.

Applicants can click here to access the MSAC Individual Artists Fellowships Application.

The deadline for 2009 applications is July 31, 2008.

In June of 2008, the Maryland State Council on the Arts will hold three technical assistance grant workshops throughout the state for residents interested in applying for individual artist fellowships. The workshops will address the application process for the categories offered for 2009 fellowships. All sites are wheelchair accessible and provide accessible parking. Sign interpretation will be offered for the hearing impaired. The workshop schedule is as follows:

Wednesday, June 18, 2008
5:30-7:30 pm
Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts
801 Chase Street
Annapolis, MD 21401
http://www.marylandhall.org

Thursday, June 19, 2008
5:30- 7:30 pm
The Writer's Center
4508 Walsh Street
Bethesda, MD 20815
http://www.writer.org

Thursday, June 26, 2008
5:30-7:30 pm
The Creative Alliance
3134 Eastern Avenue
Baltimore, MD 21224
http://www.creativealliance.org

To register for a Maryland workshop, please contact Joanna Raczynska at Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation at 410-539-6656 ext 101, or e-mail joanna@midatlanticarts.org. See each location's web site for directions to the workshop.

Contact:
email: karen@midatlanticarts.org
web: http://www.midatlanticarts.org

Call for Best New Poets

Just received, so passing on to you, Dear Writers!

I wanted to let you know that the Open Competition for Best New Poets 2008 is now taking submissions. This year's entry fee is $3.50. For full details, see http://www.bestnewpoets.org

As it has for the last three years, Best New Poets will publish 50 poems by emerging writers, which we define as someone who has yet to publish a book of their own poetry. Before you decide what poems to enter, please read our full eligibility guidelines: http://www.bestnewpoets.org/eligibility.html.

This year's guest editor is Mark Strand. Best New Poets 2008 will be available through online retailers like amazon.com and Barnes & Noble, but thanks to an agreement with the University of Virginia Press, it will also be widely distributed to retail stores.

A few big changes from past editions:

- Our Open Competition deadline is June 5, 2008, some 10 days earlier than last year.

- Our entry fee has been lowered to $3.50, but does not include a copy of the book. After we announce our results, Open Competition entrants will have the opportunity to buy copies at a reduced rate (about $6) but this is entirely optional.

- All Open Competition entrants published in the book will receive a payment of $50.

Another big change is that we're taking submissions through ManuscriptHub.com this year. This is an online submission service where you can upload a manuscript once but submit it to multiple magazines. You can also withdraw individual manuscripts from consideration and track the progress of multiple submissions in one place.

For best results, we ask that you prepare your manuscripts this way:

You can upload two poems per entry. We recommend saving each poem in a separate file. Please save using the following formats: MS Word .doc or .rtf, or as a .txt (text) or a .pdf (Acrobat) file. Please do not put your name on the manuscripts or in the file names. ManuscriptHub links the manuscripts to your account but keeps the reading process blind until we make final selections.

Then,

- Go to http://www.manuscripthub.com and register/log in.

- Click the blue "Your Manuscripts" icon and upload all your poetry.

- When your manuscripts are on the system, click the blue "Submit Work" icon.

- A list of magazines appears. Select the "Best New Poets 2008" link next to our cover.

- Use the drop-down menus next to "Manuscript 1" and "2" to select which manuscripts to submit.

- Click the "Submit" button.

- Click the "Pay Now" button to pay your $3.50 fee by credit card. If you plan to enter more than once, you can wait to make one payment. Just click the blue "Submit Work" icon, select "Best New Poets 2008" again, and create another submission. Then pay once at the end.

We apologize if this seems like a lot of steps. Because ManuscriptHub takes submissions for several magazines, you have to first upload your manuscripts, and then submit them to a particular magazine/competition. You can always check the status of a submission by clicking on the blue "Submission Status" icon. An "open" submission is one we've received and that's been marked paid. Feel free to e-mail if you get lost during the submission process.

Jeb Livingood
Series Editor, Best New Poets
www.bestnewpoets.org

2008 Million Writers Award

The 2008 Million Writers Award for best online short story is now open for nominations from editors and readers. Once again, the Edit Red Writing Community is sponsoring the contest, which means there is a $300 prize for the overall winner. For those who don't feel like wading through the rules, here's the award process in a nutshell:

Any story published during 2007 in an online magazine journal is eligible. The caveats are that said online mag or journal must have an editorial process--meaning no self-published stories--and the story must be at least a 1,000 words in length. Readers may nominate one story for the award. Editors of online publications may nominate up to three stories from their publication. All nominations are due by March 31.

A group of volunteer preliminary editors will go through the nominated stories--along with other stories that catch their interest--and select their favorites. These will become the Million Writers Award notable stories of the year. I will then go through all the notable stories and pick the top ten stories of the year. The general public will then vote on those ten stories, with the overall winner receiving the award and cash prize.

Complete information on all this, along with links to where people can nominate stories, is available on the award website HERE.

For the best writing from the new south, read storySouth at http://www.storysouth.com

Tupelo Press' $10,000 Dorset Prize in Poetry

(This is an extremely well-respected press in Vermont. They published Ilya Kaminsky's book Dancing in Odessa, a few years ago, which later won a Whiting Award. Ilya is Russian and is an amazing poet and reader. He was at Bread Loaf as a fellow this summer. You'll definitely be hearing more about him.)

Open to All Poets Writing in English

Submission Period: September 1 - December 15, 2007 (Postmark)

Again this year, the Dorset Prize includes a cash award of $10,000 in addition to publication by Tupelo Press, a book launch at Poets House in New York City, and national and international distribution through Tupelo Press and Consortium Book Sales and Distribution, Inc., Ingram and Baker & Taylor.

Manuscript Requirements:

Submit a previously unpublished, full-length poetry manuscript of between 48 and 88 pages enclosed in a folder. Include two cover pages: one with title of the manuscript only, the other with title of manuscript, name, address, telephone number and email address. Cover letter or bio optional, as these will not be read until the conclusion of the contest. Include a table of contents and, if applicable, an acknowledgments page. The Dorset Prize is open to anyone writing in the English language, regardless of prior publication history.

This year the Dorset Prize winner will be selected from a pool of 25 finalists by a judge of national distinction, to be named. All finalists will be considered for publication.

Terms:

A reading fee of $25 (US) by check (or PayPal) must accompany each submission, made payable to Tupelo Press, Inc. This year, your reading fee entitles you to select any book (other than an anthology) from our online catalogue (www.tupelopress.org), which we will then mail to you at our cost. Please indicate your selection at the time of your submission on a separate index card with your name, mailing address and choice.

You may include a stamped, self-addressed postcard to confirm receipt of manuscript. Simultaneous submissions are permitted, so long as you notify Tupelo Press promptly if manuscript is accepted elsewhere. Multiple submissions are permitted so long as each manuscript is accompanied by separate entry fee. Individual poems may have been published previously in magazines, journals or anthologies, but the work as a whole must be unpublished. Translations and previously self-published books are not eligible.

Notification:

Enclose SASE for notification of winner. Do not enclose SASE for return of manuscript; all manuscripts will be recycled at the conclusion of the competition, except for those under consideration for future publication. Results will be announced in late April.

Entry must be postmarked between September 1 and December 15, 2007.

More details: Tupelo Press

Writers Digest Short Story Competition

In their words:

We're looking for fiction that's bold, brilliant...but brief. Send us your best in 1,500 words or fewer.
But don't be too long about it—the deadline is Monday, December 03, 2007.

PRIZES
First Place: $3,000
Second Place: $1,500
Third Place: $500
Fourth Through Tenth Place: $100
Eleventh Through Twenty-Fifth Place: $50 gift certificate for Writer's Digest Books

* The First-Place winner has the option of a FREE "Best Seller Publishing Package" from Trafford Publishing.

For Guidelines: Writers Digest Short Story Competition

Fiction Contest

Story Quarterly announces that their new system for receiving submissions year-round is now online. Also, the SQ Fiction Contest is accepting entries until September 30 and offers a First Prize of $2,500, a Second Prize of $1,500, and a Third Prize of $750. Additionally, ten Finalists will each receive $100.

Go to: Story Quarterly

First Line Contest

ThatFirstLine Writing Contest deadline is approaching.

Our next winner will receive $500 for writing one line! The 2007 Spring/Summer contest entry deadline is September 1st! The contest is open to everyone everywhere.

You can enter your line at http://www.thatfirstline.com

or check-out our previous winners at http://www.zirdnews.com

If you've already entered, good luck and thanks for your support.

Ben Jackson
Contest Coordinator