The 2019 Newcastle Writers Festival/ joanne burns Microlit Award
The 2019 joanne burns Microlit Award is jointly sponsored by the Newcastle Writers Festival and publisher Spineless Wonders. We are looking for writing (up to 200 words) that responds imaginatively…
The 2019 joanne burns Microlit Award is jointly sponsored by the Newcastle Writers Festival and publisher Spineless Wonders. We are looking for writing (up to 200 words) that responds imaginatively to the theme of SCARS. Judged by Cassandra Atherton.
National and Hunter Region categories. First prize in each category will be $300. Theme: SCARS. Length: 200 word max. Closing date: Sept 30 2019
Entry fee: $15 for three submissions (National category). Free for Hunter Region entrants.
Call out:
Submissions of up to 200 words on the theme of SCARS are sought for the 2019 NWF/joanne burns Microlit Award.
To enter the National category, click here.
To enter the Hunter Region category, click here.
We acquire scars sometimes by accident and sometimes by design. Scars may be evidence of past and ongoing hurt. They can stand witness to our rites of passage or transformation. They may mar or they may make our appearance. They may be invisible.
We are looking for microlit on the theme of SCARS. Your submission may be fiction or creative nonfiction, memoir or speculative. You may choose to write in any prose genre or mode (including prose poetry) – in fact, hybrid forms are encouraged. Your approach may be playful, witty, political, philosophical or all of the above.
The 2019 joanne burns Microlit Award, which is co-sponsored by Spineless Wonders and the Newcastle Writers Festival, will be judged by CASSANDRA ATHERTON. Cash prizes of $300 will be awarded to the winner of the National and Hunter categories.
Finalists in the award will be offered publication in the Spineless Wonders’ anthology, Scars, and selected entries will be included in Spineless Wonders’ multi-platform storytelling activities at the 2020 Newcastle Writers Festival.
All texts included in the anthology will be considered for inclusion in a range of Spineless Wonders’ multiplatform collaborations including #storybombing activities such as StoryPhones, StoryPosters, StoryPostcards and Pavement Pages as part of the Newcastle Writers Festival, in the University of Technology, Sydney’s, Microflix Animation Project, as part of the Microflix Award and in live performances and podcasts.
Please Note:
Before writing any fictional piece regarding a culture different from your own, make sure you are doing so in a respectful and intelligent manner.
On copyright:
By entering the competition, writers grant Spineless Wonders and the Newcastle Writers Festival limited, fee-free, licence to publish their work and/or produce and broadcast it as audio or video. Intellectual Property shall remain with individual author on the understanding that the work not be published elsewhere until after December, 2020.
About our judge:
Cassandra Atherton is judge of the joanne burns Microlit Award and series editor of the annual Spineless Wonders’ microlit anthology. Find out more about microlit in our interview with Cassandra, here. An award-winning writer and critic, Cassandra is an expert on prose poetry. She is an associate professor at Deakin University in Literary Studies and Creative Writing and was also recently a Harvard Visiting Scholar in English. Her most recent books of prose poetry are Trace (Finlay Lloyd, 2015) and Exhumed (Grand Parade, 2015). Find out more about her achievements and interests here
Submission Guidelines / Conditions of Entry:
- Submissions will only be accepted via the Submittable link.
- Entry fee is $15.00 for up to three submissions per entry for National category and free entry for people residing in the Hunter region. (There is no limit to the number of entries per person.)
- Entrants must be over 18 years of age and must be either an Australian citizen (living anywhere) or a person residing in Australia.
- Entries will be judged anonymously. The author’s name must not appear on the manuscript.
- The judge’s decisions will be final. No correspondence will be entered in to.
- Entries are to be no more than 200 words (exclusive of the title).
- Submissions under consideration by another competition or publication or work that has been previously published or awarded will not be accepted.
- By entering this competition, writers grant Spineless Wonders and the Newcastle Writers Festival limited, fee-free, licence to publish their work and/or produce and broadcast it as audio or video. Intellectual Property shall remain with individual author on the understanding that the work not be published elsewhere until after December, 2020.
- The closing date is 30 September, 2019. Entries will be accepted up until midnight AEST. Late entries will not be accepted.
- Results will be announced by December, 2019.
- Spineless Wonders will offer publication to the winner and finalists in its annual anthology. All published entries, including the winner, may be edited.
For any further inquiries, email info[at]shortaustralianstories.com
To enter the National category, click here.
To enter the Hunter Region category, click here.
