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Contests : Margaret Reid Poetry Contest : Guidelines
Welcome to the sixth annual Margaret Reid Poetry Contest sponsored by Tom Howard Books. First prize is $2,000. A total of $5,250 in prizes will be awarded. Click here to read the winning poems from past contests.
Submission Period
Entries accepted November 15-June 30 (postmark dates)
This contest is not yet open, and the rules below may change. Please wait until November 15 or later to submit. However, if you are here to complete an entry that was begun before July 1, then you may proceed.
What to Submit
Poetry in traditional verse forms. Your entry should be your own original work. You may submit the same poem simultaneously to this contest and to others, and you may submit poems that have been published or won prizes elsewhere, as long as you own the online publication rights.
What are traditional verse forms? By traditional verse, we
mean any form of poetry that has been in circulation for 50 years or more. The
poems you submit should follow some kind of formal or informal pattern. This
pattern might involve rhyme, meter, length of line, repetition, or some other
pattern, strict or loose. Forms that qualify
include free verse (as exemplified by such poets as
T.S. Eliot,
Ezra Pound,
Walt Whitman,
Stephen Spender),
"sprung" verse (Gerard
Manley Hopkins), narrative verse (Alfred
Noyes), satirical verse (e.e. cummings: "my
sweet old etcetera";
Dorothy
Parker), nonsense verse (Edward
Lear), lyric verse (Tennyson),
romantic verse (Wordsworth),
religious verse (James Russell
Lowell), children's verse (A.A.
Milne), comic verse and parodies (W.S.
Gilbert, A.P.
Herbert), sonnets, haiku, ghazals, ballads, odes, villanelles, sestinas,
songs, hymns, etc. For your reference, this Glossary
of Poetic Terms describes many forms. You may also enjoy sites for traditional and exotic forms of poetry found on our resource
pages.
Prizes and Publication
First prize: $2,000. Second prize: $1,000. Third prize: $500. Fourth prize: $250. There will also be five High Distinction Awards of $200 each, and five Most Highly Commended Awards of $100 each. The top 14 entries will be published on the Winning Writers website (over one million page views per year) and announced in Tom Howard Contest News and the Winning Writers Newsletter, a combined audience of over 20,000 readers.
Entry Fee
The reading fee is $7 for every 25 lines you submit. If you submit a sonnet
of 14 lines and a haiku of 3 lines, totaling 17 lines, the fee would be $7.
If you submit two villanelles of 19 lines each, totaling 38 lines, the fee would
be $14. Exclude your poem titles and any blank lines from your line count.
There is no limit on the number of lines or number of poems you may submit. Please note: Generally entry fees are not refundable. However, if you believe you have an exceptional circumstance, please contact us within one year of your entry.
Deadline
June 30, 2009. Your entry must be postmarked or submitted online by this date.
How To Submit
Click here to submit online (credit card)
Click here to submit by mail (check or money order)
Click here to submit via PayPal
Announcement of Winners
We are pleased to present the winners of the fourth contest here. The winners of the fifth contest will be announced on WinningWriters.com on October 15, 2008 (delayed from September 15 to allow more time for judging). The winners of the sixth contest will be announced on October 15, 2009. Entrants with valid email addresses will receive an email notification.
English Language
Poets of all nations may enter. However, the poems you submit should be in English. If you have written a poem in another language, you may translate your poem into English and submit the translation.
Privacy
Your privacy is assured. Neither Winning Writers nor Tom Howard Books will
rent your information to third parties. Winning Writers processes entries and
fees for this contest as a service to Tom Howard Books. Winning Writers is
not a sponsor and does not judge the entries.
Copyright
If your entry wins any cash prize, you agree to give both John H. Reid and Winning Writers a nonexclusive license to publish your work online. From time to time, selected winning entries may also be published in printed collections. If you win a prize, we may ask you for permission to include your entry in one of these books. You may accept or decline this invitation as you choose. Your entry will not be published in print without your consent, and you retain all other rights. You are free, for example, to publish your work in print or online elsewhere, and to enter it into other contests, whether or not you win a prize in this contest.
 Judges
A former journalist and magazine editor, John H. Reid has judged literary contests for over 15 years. He has published several novels, a collection of poetry, a guide to winning literary contests and 24 books of film criticism and movie history. See his work at Lulu. Mr. Reid is assisted by Dee C. Konrad. A leading educator and published author, Ms. Konrad was Associate Professor in the English faculty of Barat College of DePaul University, and served as Dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences for the year 2000-2001.
About Winning Writers
Winning Writers finds and creates quality resources for poets and writers. Our expert online poetry contest guide, Poetry Contest Insider, profiles over 750 poetry contests. We directly sponsor the Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry Contest and the War Poetry Contest. We also assist the Tom Howard/John H. Reid Short Story Contest, the Margaret Reid Poetry Contest for Traditional Verse and the Tom Howard/John H. Reid Poetry Contest. Winning Writers is proud to be one of "101 Best Websites for Writers" (Writer's Digest, 2005-2008) and a recipient of the Truly Useful Site Award (Preditors & Editors, March 2006).
Questions about this contest? Please see the Frequently Asked Questions or click
here to send a note to the contest administrator.
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