Guides
Success in writing competitions
A short set of pages on what a prize can do, who has used one as a step into print, how to improve your odds, and how to use this calendar without entering everything that closes on Friday.
Competitions are not a secret door. They are a public one, with a word count, a fee or the lack of one, and a person at the other end who has agreed to read. Some of those readers are agents and editors. Some are poets who have judged the same prize for years. A win is lovely. A longlist is useful. A well-chosen entry, even when it comes back with nothing, is practice at sending finished work into the world.
These pages are for writers who already have something on the desk and want a sensible way to send it out. Stewart Ferris has been entering competitions since he was eleven, from a local radio poem prize to the University of Surrey Creative Writing Prize. He has written about that. The calendar exists so the deadlines are in one place. The advice here is about what to do with them.
- 1. Writers who went on from a prizeKit de Waal, Kate Atkinson, Deepa Anappara, Kim Sherwood, Jo Browning Wroe, and a few more recent paths into print.
- 2. Improving your oddsRules, readers, openings, fees, and why a listing can matter as much as first place.
- 3. Mistakes that knock people outThe boring ones. Blind judging, word counts, rights, themes stuck on at the end.
- 4. Using The Prize CalendarFilters, fortnight lists, bookmarks, and when to leave the site for the official rules.
- 5. A year of entriesA light plan for short fiction, poetry, novels and scripts, without turning writing into admin.
Always check the official competition site before you enter. Fees, word limits and eligibility change. Dates on the calendar for a repeating prize are often last year’s pattern, which is a prompt to look, not a promise.