Winchester Poetry Prize 2023 Opens!
- Deadline:۳۱ July 2023
- Winchester Poetry Festival was established in 2013 with the first festival taking place in September 2014. We also promote one-off events and work in partnership with Hampshire Cultural Trust to run the Hampshire Poet programme and the Hampshire Young Poet Competition.
About The Competition
- We’re here to be a round table for poetry where everyone is welcome.
- We are a poetry organisation that does all sorts of things – from hosting our much-acclaimed biennial festival in Winchester, to our popular Winchester Poetry Prize competition, to our wider work with schools and community organisations.
RULES
- Opening date: midday on 3 April 2023. Entries received before this time will not be considered
- Closing date: midnight on 31 July 2023. Entries received after this time will not be considered.
- The competition is open to anyone aged 16 or over.
- Entries may be submitted via email or by post.
- Poems may be on any subject and in any form or style.
- They must be typed and not longer than 40 lines (excluding title).
- Poems must be in English, must be the entrant’s own work. They may not be the translated work of another poet.
- Poems must not have been published or accepted for publication elsewhere (including online).
- Poems must not have been submitted for or won any other poetry competition at the time of submission. Poems may be submitted for other competitions after the closing date, but entrants must withdraw their poems from the
- Winchester Poetry Festival in the event of being shortlisted for any other prize.
- Entry fee: £۶ for first poem, £۵ for subsequent poems in a single submission.
- A number of free entries are available for poets to whom an entry fee would be a barrier. Online entrants can select the option to subsidise fees for other poets under the ‘Pay It Forward’ scheme.
- Do not put your name or any other form of identification on your poem. All poems are judged anonymously.
- Our judge will read all qualifying entries.
- No person may win more than one cash prize, though more than one poem may feature in the list of Commended and Highly Commended poems.
- No changes may be made to a poem once it has been submitted.
- The decision of the judge is final and no correspondence will be entered into.
- Winchester Poetry Festival Trustees, employees or associates, or members of their families, may not enter.
- We will contact the longlisted poets by email or post in mid September 2023. The result will be announced live as part of the Winchester Poetry Festival, on Sunday 15 October 2023.
- Travel expenses to read at the prize-giving in Winchester are not covered.
- Your entry in the competition indicates acceptance of these rules.
Entry Fees
- Entry fee: £۶ for first poem, £۵ for subsequent poems.
- Pay it forward – Free entries for poets on low incomes. We have a pay-it-forward scheme originally set up by 2020’s competition winner, Lewis Buxton. This enables those who can afford to enter the competition to support emerging poets who cannot. Details of how you can contribute to, or benefit from, this scheme can be found below.
Prizes
- First Prize: £۱,۰۰۰
- 2nd Prize: £۵۰۰
- 3rd Prize: £۲۵۰
