SA Writers Circle

Entries for the 2011 PEN/Studzinski Literary Awards are invited from 1 March 2010.

The South African Centre of International PEN (SA PEN) is pleased to announce the launch of the second in the series of PEN/Studzinski Literary Awards.

Entries for the award for original short stories in English are called for from 1 March 2010 and African Pens, a compilation of the short-listed stories, will be published in mid-2011.

Prizes totalling £10 000 will once again be donated by American philanthropist and global investment banker, John Studzinski. The first, second and third prizes will be £5 000, £3 000 and £2 000, respectively.

Nobel Laureate and SA PEN Honorary Member, JM Coetzee, will once again select the winning entries.

The 2011 PEN/Studzinski Literary Awards aims to encourage creative writing in Southern Africa and will offer talented writers an exciting opportunity to launch or develop a literary career. Twelve contributors to our earlier HSBC/SA PEN series have now published their own books, including Ceridwen Dovey who won the 2008 Sunday Times Fiction Prize. Petina Gappah, an early winner, went on to sign a three-book contract with Faber & Faber in the UK and Farrar Strauss & Giroux in the US. Three of the five short-listed stories for the Caine prize for African Writing first appeared in African Pens 2007 – the model for African Pens 2011. The story, "Poison", set in a threatened Cape Town, and written by author Henrietta Rose-Innes, was chosen by JM Coetzee as the winner of the 2007 HSBC/SA PEN Literary Award and it went on to win the 2008 Caine Prize of £10 000.

Our 2009 project, led by author Shaun Johnson, received over 800 entries from writers throughout Africa, but this year we revert to appealing only to writers living in the fifteen countries of the Southern African Development Community (SADC*). The genre is still the short-story, this time between 3 000 and 5 000 words.

Writers who are citizens of SADC countries* are encouraged to prepare short stories for submission. Further information and detailed rules of entry will be posted on the SA PEN website, www.sapen.co.za, from the 1 March 2010.
Previous publications featuring the shortlisted and winning stories from the 2005, 2006 and 2007 HSBC/SA PEN, and 2009 PEN/Studzinski Literary Awards are: African Compass (2005, New Africa Books), African Road (2006, New Africa Books), African Pens (2007, New Africa Books), New Writing from Africa 2009 (2009, Johnson & KingJames Books).

* SADC countries: Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

Write! Africa Write!

For administrative enquiries, contact:
Deborah Horn-Botha, Secretary – SA PEN
Tel: +27 (0)21 701 8510
Email: rudebs@icon.co.za

Ter oordenking van die 100 jaar sedert Uniewording – toe Suid-Afrika op 31 Mei 1910 tot stand gekom het – bied die FW de Klerk Stigting, LitNet en Beeld gesamentlik van 28 Mei tot 29 Augustus ’n artikelkompetisie aan. Alle inskrywings word deurlopend op ’n spesiale LitNet-blog gepubliseer en wenartikels word tweeweekliks in Beeld geplaas.

Die skrywer van die uiteindelike en algehele wenartikel ontvang R3 000 en dié van elke artikel wat tweeweekliks gekies word om in Beeld te verskyn, R1 200 per artikel.

Klik hier vir die kompetisieproses, aanbevole leeswerk en reëls: http://blogs.litnet.co.za/100jaarsa/100-jaar-suid-afrika-artikelkompetisie#kompetisie

Go to www.bcsa.co.uk

The BCSA’s 2010 writing competition is now open.

Fact or fiction – both are welcome. A first prize of £300 and a second prize of £100 will be awarded to the best 1,500 to 2,000-word pieces of original writing in English on the links between Britain and the Czech/Slovak Republics, or describing society in transition in the Republics since the Velvet Revolution in 1989. Topics can include history, politics, the sciences, economics, the arts or literature.

The writer of this year's winning entry will be presented with the prize at the BCSA’s annual dinner in London in November 2010. The piece will be published in the December 2010 issue of the British Czech and Slovak Review.

Submissions are invited from individuals of any age, nationality or educational background. Entrants do not need to be members of the BCSA.

Entry is free. Entries should be received by 31 July. An author may submit any number of entries. The competition will be judged by a panel of experts. The writer of the prize-winning entry will be notified by 30 September 2010.

Entries should be submitted by post to the BCSA Prize Administrator, 24 Ferndale, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, TN2 3NS, England, or by email to prize @ bcsa . co . uk.

Submission guidelines

All entries must be in English, prose, typed with double-spacing and no more than 2,000 words in length. (The recommended minimum is 1,500 words.) If submitted by e-mail, entries should be in Microsoft Word 97/2000/XP or a compatible format.

To ensure objective and anonymous judging the writer's name must not appear anywhere on the piece itself.

The title must appear on the first page of the entry.

All entries must be accompanied by a cover sheet, which should include the following information:
the writer's name, address, home telephone/fax number, e-mail address, date of birth, and brief biography (not more than four lines in length)

the title of the piece and the word count

A signed statement verifying that the submission is an original piece of writing by the writer and has not been previously published, and that
any citations are complete, correct and acknowledged in due form

a note of how the entrant learned about the competition.
The BCSA’s decision on the winning entries will be final. Entries are subject to the rules of the competition, which are available free on request from the BCSA Prize Administrator at the addresses given above, or by phone on +44 (0) 1892 543206. Copies of this notice are also available free from the Prize Administrator.

Information on the BCSA's writing competitions can be obtained from the BCSA Prize Administrator, 24 Ferndale, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, TN2 3NS, England, or by email to prize @ bcsa . co . uk.

Besonderhede: Al gewonder wat Saul Barnard gedink het toe Oupoot in sy nek geblaas het? In watter suburb woon Trompie en Afrikaans se gunsteling-rabbedoe, Saartjie, nou? Is Kobie uiteindelik uit die kas?

LitNet daag jou uit om ’n denkbeeldige gesprek met enige fiktiewe boekkarakter uit ’n Suid-Afrikaanse publikasie oor enige onderwerp te voer! Die fiktiewe gesprek kan enige vorm aanneem – ’n vraag-en-antwoord, ’n brief, ’n kortverhaal, ’n opvolgverhaal, ’n gedig, ens. Agaat, Liewe Heksie, Stephen Kumalo, Griet, David Lurie, Fiela, Treppie, Petrus Minter – ’n legio hoofkarakters wag om weer in die lewe geroep te word ...

Hoe neem ek deel? Stuur jou fiktiewe onderhoud van tussen 100 en 500 woorde aan imke@litnet.co.za.

Wat ek kan wen? Die twee beste onderhoude sal elk twee kaste Leopard’s Leap-wyn en vyf boeke danksy NB-Uitgewers losslaan.

Sluitingsdatum: 30 Mei 2010

It is time for the annual Shuters Story Writing Competition with fabulous prizes up for grabs for you and your school.

First prize for the winning story is a notebook computer, second prize is a desktop computer. Go to http://www.shuters.com/home/news/story-writing-competition.html for more details.

COMPETITION RULES

1.The closing date for the Shuters Story Writing Competition is 30 July, 2010. Late entries will not be considered.
2.Prize winners will be notified by 30 October 2010.
3.Stories should be suitable for children between the ages of 6 and 10 years and written by learners attending either Primary or Secondary school.
4.Illustrations to support the story are welcomed but not essential.
5.There is no restriction on the length of the story, and stories can be written in any offi cial South African language.
6.Entries will not be returned to the writer under any circumstances. The onus is on the writer to keep a copy of the manuscript should he/she wish to do so.
7.Entries must be typed or neatly handwritten – illegible writing will result in disqualifi cation.
8.It is Shuter’s intention to publish a collection of winning stories to be launched in 2010, but this remains at the discretion of the publishers.
9.Postal entries should be sent to: Shuters Story Writing Competition, PO Box 61, Mkondeni 3212, KwaZulu-Natal.
10.E-mail entries should be sent to: stories@shuters.comThis e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
11.Postal and e-mail entries must include all the information in the entry form below, excluding e-mail addresses if none are available.
(Photostats and reasonable facsimiles of the Entry Form are permissible, providing handwritten and typed entries contain all the information requested.)
12.The judges’ decisions will be fi nal. No further correspondence will be entered into.
13.Bulk entries from schools are accepted providing every individual story has a signed and completed entry form attached to it.
Download your entry form for the Shuters 2010 Story Writing Competition today and start writing!

•Short Stories (1 000 - 2 500 words)
•Essays
◦Adults (4 000 words)
◦Children (2 000 words)
•Photo Essays
Please keep images to 300kb and under and allow your powerful images tell a story of your experience (but making sure it is aligned to our two themes.)

◦Adults (10-20 images)
◦Children (5-10)
•Poetry (50– 100 words)
•Trip Reports (accounts of real trips to the Parks)
Material submitted in this category should comprise of an engagingly written account/report of a trip to a SANParks park over the last 12 months. Reports in this category should convey a strong sense of place.

•Stories by Children (ages 8 - 12)
•Stories by Children (ages 13 - 17)

Closing date: 31 October 2010
Go to http://www.sanparks.org/events/writing_comp/default.php for more details, or contact melanieg@sanparks.org.

The theme for the 2010 women's writing project is: Love and Revolution and the closing date is 1 October 2010.

Love and Revolution are two words that are rarely used together. Where love is associated with passion, desire and romance, revolution is often associated with revolt, uprising, riot and change, these seemingly opposing emotions. Yet often when we talk about love, what we are really talking about is not just the feeling of love, but its power to transform us in ways that not even we could have imagined, and the more it begins to appear that love and revolution are in fact two sides of the same coin. Sometimes the most revolutionary act is to love. And sometimes the revolution is an act of love.

This year, POWA is calling for poems, short stories and personal essays that tell of your experience of love, be it romantic love, the love of family, the love of friends, the love of community, that has touched you in revolutionary ways that have altered the way you see and approach life.

Go to http://womenswriting.org.za/pages/contact.php for more details.

Prole has launched the search for a Prole Laureate. An open poetry competition to find a poet to represent the editorial ambitions of Prole (a literary magazine): to make writing engaging, challenging, entertaining and accessible. Click here for details: http://www.prolebooks.co.uk

Proyecto 34ºS is very pleased to announce the opening of the submission call for this project which aims to encourage the exchange and appreciation of written theatre plays from Africa and Latin America, recognising and rewarding quality, originality and cultural diversity whilst also bridging the language gap through means of translation and actively promoting and ensuring free electronic access to the selected plays by local and international readers. South African and Argentine playwrights are invited to submit written plays, in any of the national languages of these two countries, for consideration by the judging panel and according to the terms and conditions of the call. Ultimately, ten plays will be chosen from each country and will be translated from their original languages into English and Spanish. These plays will then all be available for free download from the Proyecto 34ºS website and the five Argentine finalist plays will be published in print as one volume. One winner will be chosen from each South Africa and Argentina and will be awarded with a trip to the other country in order to be present at the premier of the translated version of his/her play.
For more information, please see the full submission call, terms, conditions and application form at http://www.proyecto34s.com/ttproject/. For email queries, please contact Martina Sántolo at t_t@proyecto34s.com
http://www.proyecto34s.com/port/index.html

The Ingrid Jonker Prize for a first volume of poetry was introduced in July 1965 to honour the memory of Ingrid Jonker, a poet who wrote in both English and Afrikaans. The award, which consists of a medallion and a cash amount, is awarded alternately to an Afrikaans and English debut.

Previous winners (English) of the Ingrid Jonker Prize are: Ruth Miller (1965), Sidney Clouts (1967), Sinclair Beiles (1969), Wally Serote (1973), Mark Swift (1975), Colin Style (1977), Mike Nicol (1979), Jeremy Cronin (1983), Graham Walker (1987), John Eppel (1989), Heather Robertson (1992), Ken Barris (1994), Steve Shapiro (1996), Dan Wylie (1998), Brian Walter (2000), Kobus Moolman (2002), Finuala Dowling (2004) Rustum Kozain (2006) and Megan Hall (2008).

Debut volumes of English poetry published in 2008 and 2009 are eligible for the Ingrid Jonker Prize 2010. The final deadline for submissions is the 1st of November 2010. Self-publications will be considered, but only books with an ISBN will be accepted –no manuscripts, pamphlets or poems published in magazines and/or anthologies.

Please send three copies for adjudication to:

Protea Boekwinkel
c/o Louis Esterhuizen
P.O. Box 657
Stellenbosch
7599