Mslexia

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Mslexia Women's Poetry Competition

Mslexia Poetry Competition 2012

The 2012 Mslexia Women's Poetry Competition is for previously unpublished poems of any length and in any style.

JUDGE: Gillian Clarke

1st Prize: £2,000 plus two optional extras: a week at the idyllic poets' retreat of Cove Park* and an afternoon with the editor of premier poetry magazine Poetry Review**.
2nd Prize: £400
3rd Prize: £200

17 other finalists win £25 each.
All winning poems will appear in issue 55 of Mslexia, published in September 2012

CLOSING DATE: 18 June 2012

Entry fee: £7 for up to three poems.

Please make sure you read the rules and guidelines thoroughly before submitting your entry.

Competition Rules | FAQs

ENTER THE POETRY COMPETITION

*The date of the Cove Park retreat is to be agreed between Cove Park and the competition winner. The retreat is accommodation only.
**The date of the mentoring afternoon with the Editor of Poetry Review is to be agreed between the Editor and the competition winner.
The winner is responsible for any other expenses involved in attending the Cove Park retreat and the mentoring afternoon (e.g. travel, food, etc.). These prizes must be taken before 31 December 2013.

Judge: GILLIAN CLARKE

"I’ll be listening for lines whose music leaves at least a line in my mind after one reading. The winning sound is all in the ‘voice’ of the poem, the poet’s own ‘voice’, which could be nobody else’s."

Gillian Clarke is the National Poet of Wales, as well as a playwright, editor, translator (from Welsh), creative writing tutor and President of Tŷ Newydd, the writers' centre in North Wales which she co-founded in 1990. Her poetry is studied by GCSE and A Level students throughout Britain, and her work has been translated into ten languages. Her most recent collection is Making the Beds for the Dead (Carcanet). She lives with her partner on a smallholding in Ceredigion in Wales, where they raise a small flock of sheep, and care for the land according to organic and conservation practice.

On winning...

"I’m a longtime admirer of Jo Shapcott [judge of the 2011 competition], so it’s a special thrill to know she liked the poem." – Jane Satterfield

Read what 2011's winners say about their experience of the Mslexia Poetry competition

POEtry pAmphlet competition

This year we are launching our new poetry pamphlet competition alongside our single poem competition. This new competition is for short collections of 20-24 pages of 18-20 poems, and is open to any woman poet who has not previously had a full-length collection published. The prize is publication of the pamphlet by Seren Books plus £250 and the deadline is 18 June 2012.

More information

NEW! POETRY WRITING WORKSHOPS

This year our specially-commissioned writing exercises for the poetry competition will concentrate on finding new ideas for your work, encouraging different ways of looking at creating poems and the creative process. They have been devised by the wonderful Pascale Petit, an experienced poet and teacher, and co-founding tutor of The Poetry School.

Workshop 1: Poetry from Art
Workshop 2: Available 21 May
Workshop 3: Available 4 June

EIGHT years of the Mslexia Poetry Competition – THe previous winners

• The War Years by Jane Satterfield (Jo Shapcott – 2011)
• The widower and his clothes by Margaret Livingston (Vicki Feaver – 2010)
• The Inland Waterways (IW) by Sarah Roby (Ruth Padel – 2009)
• A Song of Jean by Sibyl Ruth (Carol Ann Duffy – 2008)
• Too close by Ann Alexander (U A Fanthorpe and R V Bailey – 2007)
• For a plain man by Marianne Burton (Wendy Cope – 2006)
• Buffalo mozzarella by Polly Clark (Jo Shapcott – 2005)
• Women by Polly Clark (Selima Hill – 2004)