October 2023 Deadlines: 11 Contests and Magazines with Deadlines This Month
New month, new courage: submit your work to these fellowships, magazines, awards and internships. Remember, too, acceptances and rejections are by-products of this journey—crafting your authentic art is the goal. And as always, submit poetry for free to our New Voices. This list is powered by the deadline service Literistic!
We warmly invite all poets to submit to the Resistance & Resilience Prize! For this contest, we are especially interested in reading poems that reflect upon, live within, wrestle with, uplift, or subvert themes of resistance and resilience. We are looking for poetry of pushback and of survival, poetry that troubles power and poetry that nurtures its readers and writers alike. Send us your very best! The winning poet will be awarded $3000, publication, and a brief interview in Palette Poetry. Second and third place will receive $300 and $200, respectively, as well as publication. The top ten finalists will be selected by Palette editors, and Guest Judge Nicole Sealey will then select the top three winners for the contest.
Deadline: October 15// Fee
The prize of $3,000, with an introduction by the judge and distribution of the winning book by Copper Canyon Press through Consortium, will be awarded in 2024 with publication of the book in the same year. The author will receive a standard book publishing contract, with royalties paid in addition to the $3,000 prize. This year’s final judge is poet Roger Reeves. The prize is open to poets who have not published a book-length collection of poems with a registered ISBN.
Deadline: October 1 // Fee
Simultaneous submissions are acceptable. Work must be previously unpublished. Contributors will receive two copies of the issue in which they are published, an opportunity to purchase additional copies at half-price, and a one-year subscription. We do not offer any monetary remuneration for publication. Fiction and Nonfiction submissions should not exceed 5,000 words. One piece per submission, and only one submission per author, per submission period. Poetry submissions should not exceed five poems
Deadline: October 15 // No Fee
We are accepting both fiction and poetry submissions until October 15th. Payment for accepted pieces comes in the form of two free copies of the issue in which the piece(s) are published. Please submit only one story (5,000 words or less), or up to four short shorts or flash fiction pieces (1,000 words or less each), per reading period. If you are submitting more than one piece, please place them in a single document. For poetry, you may submit three to five poems per reading period; please group them into one document and upload them as a single Word document or PDF file.
Deadline: October 15 // No fee
The Jake Adam York Prize
The Jake Adam York Prize for a first or second poetry collection is a collaboration between Copper Nickel and Milkweed Editions. The prize-winning poet receives $2,000 and publication by Milkweed Editions. For the 2023-4 prize we will begin accepting online submissions of book-length (i.e., more than 48 pages) poetry manuscripts on July 1, 2023. The final due date for submission will be October 15, 2023. The prize winner will be announced in early March, 2024. Our judge for 2023-4 is Cynthia Cruz.
Deadline: October 15// Fee
$1,000 Editor’s Choice Award Deadline: October 16, 2023 We will begin accepting entries for the 2023 contest on July 1, 2023. Guidelines This year our editors are looking to read your best short narratives, whether they are stories, essays, poems, or hybrid forms. The only requirement is that each entry must be brief—1,000 words or fewer. Submit your work via our Submittable portal by October 16th. One winner will be awarded $1,000 and publication in New Letters. Max word count is 1,000 words The entry must be previously unpublished. Rules, Tips & Notes $20 entry fee for each manuscript submitted. A one-year subscription to New Letters, shipped to any address within the United States, is included in the price of the first entry. (Subscriptions mailed outside the U.S. require a $20 postal surcharge.) No substitutions or revisions may be made after a manuscript has been submitted. Edits can be considered prior to publication, if the manuscript wins the award. Simultaneous submissions of unpublished entries are accepted with proper notification upon acceptance elsewhere. Multiple entries are welcome with appropriate fees. The winner will be announced in early March 2024. The winner will be published in New Letters and receive a $1,000 cash prize. Online entries via Submittable only. Entries received through the postal mail will not be accepted and will be recycled upon receipt. Current students and employees at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, and current volunteer members of the New Letters and BkMk Press staffs are not eligible
Deadline: October 16 // Fee
Our Spring 2024 issue will be dedicated to poems written as collaborations. The poems may be any subject, style, or length, but must have been written by two or more co-authors. Include a note explaining your process of working together. We no longer publish essays, but always include a contributor notes section, where we ask in this case why you enjoy working with other poets. Any of the co-authors may submit up to four previously uncurated poems (or pages of short poems) at the same time, either in a single file or up to four files. Do not include your name or contact info within the file(s) content. The usually $200 payment per published poem will be divided among the co-authors.
Deadline: October 16 // Fee
The Alice James Award
The Alice James Award welcomes submissions of full-length, previously unpublished poetry manuscripts from emerging as well as established poets. Entrants must reside in the United States. In celebration of our 50th anniversary in 2023, the winner of the 2023 Alice James Award will receive $5000, book publication, and distribution through Consortium. In addition to the winning manuscript, one or more additional manuscripts may be chosen for publication as the Editor’s Choice.
Deadline: October 16 // Fee
Diode Editions Chapbook Competition
The Diode Editions Chapbook Contest is now open from February 1 through October 30, 2023 to all poets who write in English. We consider translations, welcome collaborations, and accept simultaneous submissions. If your manuscript is accepted for publication elsewhere, please notify us. Winners will be announced by November 30, 2023. The winning chapbooks will be published within a year. Chapbook contest winners will receive $750.00, publication by Diode Editions, and 20 author copies. Winners will also have select poems from their chapbooks published in Diode Poetry Journal. Submitted Chapbooks must be 25-46 pages in length.
Deadline: October 15 // Fee
Witness
Witness seeks original fiction, nonfiction, and poetry that is innovative in its approach, broad-ranging in its concerns, and unapologetic in its perspective. The magazine blends the features of a literary and an issue-oriented magazine to highlight the role of the modern writer as witness to their times. We pay our contributors $50 per published piece, whether in the print or online issue. We suggest a reading fee of $3 for a general submission, but keep an eye out for our free reading periods, or contact us directly if you have difficulty paying this fee.
Deadline: October 31 // Fee
manywor(l)ds General Submissions
manywor(l)ds is open for general submissions during the months of September and October, and year-round to review, translation, and multimedia-based submissions. A publication for “the words, works, and worlds of and by those whose bodyminds defy social expectations and invite new ways of thinking and knowing,” manywor(l)ds is particularly interested in work that exceeds and evades genre and medium classifications. Payment: $10 for previously unpublished, reprints accepted but unpaid.
Deadline: October 31 // No Fee
