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Mississippi Valley Poetry
Chapbook Contest
The Mississippi Valley Poetry Chapbook
Competition annually invites submissions for the
election of a regional (IL and IA) poet's collection and
a national poet's collection to be published by MWC
Press. Submissions must be postmarked
between May 1 and July 31 each year. The
winners will be announced online on our
website.
Contest
Brochure
Congratulations to the 2011 Regional and
National
Mississippi Valley Poetry Chapbook Contest
Winners!
The Midwest
Writing Center is proud to announce
Sandra
Marchetti
as the Regional Winner for her collection The Canopy
and Monica Wendel as the National Winner for her
collection Call it a Window, in the 2011 Mississippi
Valley Poetry
Chapbook Contest!
Their collections
were selected by our guest judges
Erin Bertram and Ann Hudson.
Sandra Marchetti
Monica Wendel
Sandra
Marchetti currently tutors and
teaches interdisciplinary studies,
literature, and writing at Elmhurst College
and Aurora University, outside of her native
Chicago. She completed her MFA in Poetry at
George Mason University in 2010. Sandra was
a finalist in Gulf Coast’s 2011
Poetry Prize and Phoebe’s 2009 Greg
Grummer Poetry Contest. She has recently
published poems in Phoebe and
Spiral Orb (spiralorb.net), and was the
“Featured Poet” in Spurt Literary
Magazine’s premiere issue. Previously,
her poems have appeared in Nolos, The
North Central Review, and
Tributaries. Sandra is an Assistant
Poetry Editor at Fifth Wednesday Journal
and publishes book reviews for PIF
Magazine. She has poems forthcoming in
Ohio State’s The Journal,
dirtcakes, and The River Oak Review.
The poems included in The Canopy are
part of a larger, unpublished manuscript
entitled, “Confluence.”
Monica
Wendel is a visiting instructor of
composition at St. Thomas Aquinas College.
She holds an MFA in poetry writing from NYU,
where she received Goldwater and Starworks
teaching fellowships, and a BA in philosophy
from the State University of New York at
Geneseo. Her poetry has appeared in the
Bellevue Literary Review, Drunken Boat,
Forklift Ohio, H_NGM_N, InDigest, Limestone,
and other journals, and is forthcoming from
Spoon River Poetry Review. Originally from
Long Island, she lives in Greenpoint,
Brooklyn.
National Judge:
Ann Hudson’s
first book, The Armillary Sphere, won the
Hollis Summers Poetry Prize and was
published by Ohio University Press. Her
poems have appeared in many literary
journals, including Crab Orchard Review,
Iris, North American Review, Prairie
Schooner, and The Seattle Review. She grew
up in Charlottesville, Virginia, and now
lives in Chicago with her husband and
children.
Regional Judge:
Erin M. Bertram is the author
of seven chapbooks, including Inland Sea,
which won the 2009 Robin Becker Chapbook
Prize, and Body of Water, which won
the 2007 Frank O'Hara Award. A past
recipient of an Academy of American Poets
Prize, a Lettre Sauvage Poetry Prize, and
two fellowships from Washington University
in St. Louis, her poems have appeared in
Hotel Amerika, Copper Nickel,
Agni, The Laurel Review, and
elsewhere, and are forthcoming in
the anthology Narrative (Dis)Continuities:
Prose Experiments by Younger American
Writers. She is a book reviewer for Pleiades
and Rain Taxi Review of Books,
and a prison-writing mentor through
PEN American Center. This year and next,
she is a Fellowship Instructor in English at
Augustana College.
Review Guidelines
Submit between 16 to 24 pages of poetry;
manuscripts should be paginated and secured
with a binder clip (no staples). No names or
identifying information should appear on the
poems.
Enclose one cover page that includes:
- chapbook title
- author name
-indicate if you are submitting to the
Regional (for residents of IL or IA) or
National contest. Those entering the
Regional contest will need to submit a copy
of their driver's license or utility bill to
prove residency.
- address
- phone
- email
Enclose a second cover page that includes
only the chapbook title to allow for blind
review.
No cover letter is required; however, if
poems have been previously published, an
acknowledgments page should be included.
Poems may be more than one page in length,
but only one poem per page. Midwest Writing
Center will publish the winning chapbook
through MWC Press and make it available for
sale. No manuscripts will be returned.
Submissions that arrive ‘postage due’ will
be returned unopened.
Submission Information
Submissions can be sent directly to Midwest
Writing Center (see address below).
Submissions can also be accepted through the
MWC's
Submission Manager.
Contest results will be announced via email.
If you wish to receive the results in the
mail, please include a SASE. To receive a
copy of the winning chapbook in either the
National or Regional contest, please include
an additional payment of $4. If you wish to
receive copies of the winning chapbooks in
BOTH the National and Regional contests,
please send an additional payment of $6.
Contact the contest administrator with any
questions by emailing
contest@midwestwritingcenter.org
with the word “chapbook:” in the subject
line.
Deadline Dates
Submissions must be postmarked between May 1
and July 31 each year.
Prizes
The winners of the Mississippi Valley Poetry
Chapbook Contest will each receive $100
prize money, have their manuscripts
published by Midwest Writing Center, and
receive 15 free copies of the finished
chapbook.
Reading Fee
There is a $15 reading fee per chapbook
entry (multiple submissions accepted). If
paying reading fee by check, make check
payable to MWC and include payment with the
manuscript submission to:
Midwest Writing Center
Mississippi Valley Poetry Chapbook Contest
225 E. 2nd St., Suite 303
Davenport, IA 52801
Restrictions
As a member of the Council of Literary
Magazines and Presses and CLMP's community
of independent literary publishers, Midwest
Writing Center believes that intent to act
ethically, clarity of guidelines, and
transparency of process form the foundation
of an ethical contest. To that end, friends,
relatives, and/or past or current students
of judges have been deemed ineligible to
enter this contest, as have past and current
board members and employees of the Midwest
Writing Center.
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