Three Omnidawn Poetry Contests:
• Poetry Chapbook Contest—$1,000
(February 1–April 22, 2013)
• First/Second Book Contest—$3,000
(May 1–June 30, 2013)
• Open Book Poetry Contest—$3,000
(November 1, 2013–December 31, 2013)
Essential Information for All Three Poetry Competitions
The winner of each of the three Omnidawn poetry book competitions wins a cash prize as indicated above for each contest, publication of the book with a full color cover by Omnidawn, 100 free copies of the winning book, and extensive display advertising and publicity, including prominent display ads in American Poetry Review, Poets & Writers Magazine, Rain Taxi Review of Books and other publications. All three Omnidawn poetry book contests have very similar guidelines and submission procedures, as completely described on this web page. The requirements that are the same for all contests include the following: Postal and online poetry contest submissions are accepted for all contests. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable. Manuscript submissions for all contests must be original, in English, and previously unpublished, although individual poems in a manuscript are still eligible for this contest if they have been previously published in print or web magazines, journals, anthologies, or on a personal web site. Revisions are not allowed during the contests. Collaborations by more than one author and translations are not eligible. All Omnidawn poetry competitions are blind, so you can submit manuscripts that contain identifying information, but please be aware that such information will be removed from manuscripts before they are passed on to our editors who select manuscripts to be sent to the judge. If we find a serious error in your entry we will contact you to obtain a correction at no cost to you, so your error will not disqualify you. Nor will a few smaller errors in your manuscript, including spelling, punctuation, formatting, or typographic errors, reduce your chances of winning. (We fully understand that such errors sometimes occur for everyone, and that these can be easily corrected later.) The only differences between Omnidawn poetry competitions are the contest dates, the judge, the dollar amount of the prize, the reading fee, the manuscript page limit, an optional Omnidawn book offer, and for one contest only, the First/Second Poetry Book Contest, a limit on the number of previously published full-size poetry books by a submitting poet. These differences are described immediately below, under the "Current Poetry Competition" and "Upcoming Poetry Competitions" headings.
Current Poetry Competition (The deadline has been extended from March 31, 2013 to April 22, 2013.)
2013 Poetry Chapbook Contest ($1,000 & Publication) February 1–April 22, 2013 Judge: Gillian Conoley
Open to all writers with no limitations on the amount of poetry a writer has published. Submissions should be 20–40 pages of poetry, not including front and back matter (so that this will fit in a 5.5 x 7 inch published chapbook of approximately 60 pages or less). Colleagues, students, and close friends of the judge, Gillian Conoley, are not eligible. Postal and online poetry contest submissions accepted. Online entries must be received and postal entries must be postmarked between February 1 and April 22, 2013 at midnight Pacific Standard Time. Reading fee is $18 for the poetry chapbook contest. For $2 extra to cover shipping cost, entrants who provide a U.S. mailing address may choose to receive this contest's winning chapbook or any Omnidawn chapbook. A complete list of all Omnidawn chapbooks is available at www.omnidawn.com/chapbook-catalog.htm. The poetry chapbook contests winner will be announced to our Email list and on this web page in August 2013, and we expect to publish the winning chapbook in December of 2013. To view details about previous winners below click here.
All the essential information for the Poetry Chapbook Contest is contained in the above two paragraphs.
If you want to read helpful additional details below, which are virtually identical for all Omnidawn contests, and then go to the submission procedures, you can:
OR, if you want to skip the additional details and go directly to concise submission procedures, you can either:
Go to the POSTAL submission procedure below by clicking here.
OR
Go to the ONLINE poetry contest submission web page by clicking here, or paste the following link into your browser: www.omnidawn.net
Upcoming Poetry Competitions
2013 First/Second Book ($3,000 & Publication) May 1–June 30, 2013 Judge: Donald Revell
First/Second Book poetry contest open to writers who have either never published a full-length book of poetry, or who have published only one full-length book of poetry, so that the winning book would become a poet's first or second published book of poetry. Writers who have published two or more full length books of poetry are NOT eligible. (Chapbooks do not count.) The manuscript page limit is 120 pages for this poetry book contest. (Most manuscripts we receive are 40-70 pages long.) Colleagues, students, and close friends of the judge, Donald Revell, are not eligible. Postal and online poetry contests submissions accepted. Online entries must be received and postal entries must be postmarked between May 1 and June 30, 2013 at midnight Pacific Daylight Time. Reading fee is $27. For $3 extra to cover shipping cost, entrants who provide a U.S. mailing address may choose to receive this contest's winning book or any Omnidawn book (including 4 PEN USA winning books). A complete list of all Omnidawn books is available at www.omnidawn.com/catalog.htm. The winner will be announced to our Email list and on this web page in January 2014, and we expect to publish the winning book in the fall of 2014. Click here for helpful additional details and submission procedures that are virtually identical for all Omnidawn Contests.
2013 Open Book ($3,000 & Publication) November 1, 2013.–December 31, 2013 Judge: Forrest Gander
Open poetry book competition for all writers with no limitations on the amount of poetry a writer has published. The manuscript page limit is 120 pages for this poetry book contest. (Most manuscripts we receive are 40-80 pages long.) Colleagues, students, and close friends of the judge, Forrest Gander, are not eligible. Postal and online poetry contest submissions accepted. Online entries must be received and postal entries must be postmarked between November 1 and December 31, 2013 at midnight Pacific Standard Time. Reading fee is $27. For $3 extra to cover shipping cost, entrants who provide a U.S. mailing address may choose to receive this contest's winning book or any Omnidawn book (including 4 PEN USA winning books). A complete list of all current Omnidawn books is available at www.omnidawn.com/catalog.htm. The winner will be announced to our Email list and on this web page in May 2014, and we expect to publish the winning book in the spring of 2015. Click here for helpful additional details and submission procedures that are virtually identical for all Omnidawn Contests.