Canadian Contests and Awards

• The Petra Kenney Poetry Awards are now accepting entries for the 2006 competition, deadline for North America is December 31st, deadline for the UK and rest of the world is December 1st. For full list of winners and 2006 click here and for the application please click here.
• A good place to keep up on contests of interest to Canadian poets was Smith's List. After years of sterling volunteer work, League member E. Russell Smith has retired from updating his Literary Contests Page. However, there's good news: the Writer's Circle of Durham Region has agreed to take over this valuable service. Their contest list is now available here.
• The annual Griffin Poetry Prize divides $80,000 into equal prizes for the best Canadian and the best International poetry collections.
• Broken Jaw Press runs the Poet's Corner Award, publishing annually the best poetry manuscript received.
• The Milton Acorn People's Poetry Award invites nominations from poets, publishers and self-publishers for chapbooks or full collections published in the current or previous year.
• The Utmost Christian Poetry Contest is offered by Utmost Christian Writers and awards over $1400 in prizes to the best poems by poets of Christian faith. Utmost also offers a paying market for literary poetry.
• Wordwrights Canada hosts the Annual Canadian Student and Chapbook Writing Competitions .
• ARC, which describes itself as "Canada's national poetry magazine," has an annual poetry contest with a first prize of $1,000.
• The Antigonish Review runs The Annual Great Blue Heron Poetry Contest . Current rules are a maximum of 4 pages or 150 lines per entry. Prizes are publication and $800 first, #500 second, $300 third. Entry fee is $25, which includes a one-year subscription to the review.
• The Ontario Poetry Association runs an annual contest. Check here for details .
• There's a useful list of Canadian poetry contests at this Ottawa site.
• The literary magazine Lichen started a new contest with its clever "serial poet" contest. Check here for details on the mag's next contest.
• CBC Radio hosts the Annual Poetry Face-off in which poets vie for the winning spot and listeners can vote for their favourite wordsmith on-line or by phone. Voting on the current face-off ends April 27.
• The League of Canadian Poets offers a number of poetry awards, including
  • The Poetic Licence Contest, Canada's premier contest for poetry by youth, publishing the winning poems in the Junior and Senior categories.
  • The Pat Lowther Memorial Award, given for the best book of poetry by a Canadian woman published in the preceding year,in memory of the late Pat Lowther, whose career was cut short by her untimely death in 1975.
  • and The Gerald Lampert Memorial Award, recognizing the best first book of poetry published by a Canadian in the preceding year, honours an early Executive Director of the League.
• The Cranberry Tree Poetry Contest publishes winners in an anthology.
• The Quebec Writers' Association offers a number of awards, including
  • Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction
  • First Book Prize
  • Mavis Gallant Prize for Non-ficton
  • A. M. Klein Prize for Poetry
  • Translation Prize
  • Community Service Award
• Prairie Fire, one of Canada's premier literary magazines, has annual poetry, fiction and creative non-fiction/personal journalism contests.

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International Contests and Awards

• The new, annual, Griffin Poetry Prize divides $80,000 into equal prizes for the best Canadian and the best International poetry collections.
• Fence magazine offers two contests: The 2003 Alberta Prize, for a first or second full-length collection of poems by an American woman, and the Modern Poets Series 2003, for a full-length collection by a poet writing in English at any stage in his or her career.
• The Poetry Kit maintains a list of poetry competitions, worldwide. Invaluable.
• The Association of New Zealand Writers hosts a list of international poetry contests.
• The Art Deadlines list is a FREE email newsletter listing art competitions, art scholarships, art grants, juried exhibitions, art jobs & internships, call for entries/proposals/papers, writing & photo contests, residencies, design & architecture competitions, auditions, tryouts, fellowships, festivals, funding, financial aid, and other opportunities (including some that take place on the web) for artists, art educators and art students of all ages. The Free edition provides 20-40 items a month. A deluxe paid edition, which provides 500 items a month, is also available.
• Poetry Online has a page listing many contests for youth and amateurs.
• To learn more about how you may or may not be taken in by contests, check out our extensive coverage of poetry scams at our Poetry Spoken Here Store.

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