GUIDELINES FOR THE 2011 CHARLES JOHNSON STUDENT FICTION AWARD
The Charles Johnson Student Fiction Award from Southern Illinois University Carbondale is an annual award competition intended to encourage increased artistic and intellectual growth among students, as well as reward excellence and diversity in creative writing. Each year, $1000 and a signed copy of a Charles Johnson book will be awarded to the winner. The winning entry will also be published in the Winter/Spring issue of CRAB ORCHARD REVIEW. The award is co-sponsored by Charles Johnson, CRAB ORCHARD REVIEW, and the SIUC Department of English and College of Liberal Arts.
The award competition is open to all undergraduate and graduate students who are U.S. citizens or permanent residents currently enrolled full- or part-time in a U.S. college or university. There is no entry fee. Entrants may only submit one story. All entries will be screened by published and accomplished writers and editors. The award winner will be selected by Charles Johnson. Finalists must meet all contest guidelines and be able to verify their status as students. (Evidence of current enrollment: a xeroxed copy of a grade transcript, a class schedule or receipt of payment of tuition showing your full- or part-time status for the Spring 2011 semester. The name of the institution and its address must be clear. Please indicate the name of the department of your major field of study.)
Submit one unpublished short story, no longer than 20 pages in length. All entries must be typed double-spaced. Please type or print full name, complete address, phone number, e-mail address, and name of college or university attending on a cover page for the manuscript. Cover letters are not required. Submissions must be postmarked in February 2011. Entries will not be returned, and we are unable to provide feedback on the entries. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable, but the contest director must be informed immediately if a story is accepted for publication elsewhere.
Include a self-addressed, stamped envelope for notification of contest results. If you would like confirmation that the manuscript has been received, please include a self-addressed, stamped postcard as well. The winner will be announced in September 2011 on the Southern Illinois University Carbondale website <http://johnson.siuc.edu/winners.html>.
Mail entries (with a self-addressed stamped envelope) to:
Allison Joseph Charles Johnson Student Fiction Award
English Department– Mail Code 4503 Southern Illinois University Carbondale
1000 Faner Drive Carbondale, IL 62901 You may e-mail questions or comments to aljoseph@siu.edu. Electronic submissions and faxes are not accepted.
Dr. Charles Johnson, a 1998 MacArthur Fellow, received the National Book Award for his novel MIDDLE PASSAGE in 1990, and is a 2002 recipient of the Academy Award for Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2003, he was elected to membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has published three other novels, including DREAMER (1998) OXHERDING TALE (1982) and FAITH AND THE GOOD THING (1974) as well as two story collections, THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE (1986) and SOULCATCHER (2001). Among his many books are KING: THE PHOTOBIOGRAPHY OF MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. (co-authored with Bob Adelman, 2000), AFRICANS IN AMERICA: AMERICA’S JOURNEY THROUGH SLAVERY (co-authored with Patricia Smith, 1998), BEING AND RACE: BLACK WRITING SINCE 1970 (1988), BLACK MEN SPEAKING (co-edited with John McCluskey Jr., 1997), and two books of drawings. His newest book is TURNING THE WHEEL: ESSAYS ON BUDDHISM AND WRITING (Scribner, spring 2003). In the fall of 2004, University of Washington Press will publish PASSING THE THREE GATES: INTERVIEWS WITH CHARLES JOHNSON, edited by Dr. James McWilliams, and in February, 2005 Scribner will publish his third story collection, DR. KING’S REFRIGERATOR AND OTHER BEDTIME STORIES. His work has appeared in numerous publications in America and abroad, has been translated into nine languages, and he has received the Lifetime Achievement in the Arts Award from the Corporate Council for the Arts as well as many other awards. In 2003, The Charles Johnson Society was inaugurated at the American Literature Association. In 1999 Indiana University published a “reader” of his work entitled, I CALL MYSELF AN ARTIST: WRITINGS BY AND ABOUT CHARLES JOHNSON.
Born in Evanston, Illinois, Charles Johnson began his career as a cartoonist and had his work published when he was just 17. Many of his cartoons were published first in the DAILY EGYPTIAN, the campus newspaper at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. As an undergraduate at SIUC, Johnson studied with, and was deeply influenced by, novelist and literary theorist John Gardner. A Ph.D. in philosophy, Charles Johnson earned his bachelor's and master's degrees from SIUC in 1971 and 1973, respectively. In 1995, he received an honorary doctorate in Humane Letters from Southern Illinois University, and in 1994 an honorary Doctor of Arts degree from Northwestern. A literary critic, screenwriter, philosopher, international lecturer and cartoonist with over 1,000 drawings published, he was the S. Wilson and Grace M. Pollock Endowed Professor of English at the University of Washington in Seattle. He retired in the Summer of 2009. You may visit his author’s website at www.oxherdingtale.com, and additional information on his work can be found at these web pages, http://johnson.siuc.edu and http://charlesjohnson.wlu.edu.