Why Enter the Washington Prize?

What distinguishes The Word Works Washington Prize, an award of $1500 and book publication, from other book-length poetry manuscript prizes?

THE WASHINGTON PRIZE BENEFITS EVERY ENTRANT

Every entrant gets a copy of the winning book. The winning book is selected in the late summer and then, after undergoing our attentive editorial process, published in late January or February.

Entrants whose manuscripts progress to second readers and final judges are offered the opportunity to request comments. Therefore, semi-finalists and finalists can get constructive feedback from a reader and possibly a final judge. We have heard that entrants getting such feedback have gone on to win other prizes and for that, we are pleased because The Word is in the business of supporting contemporary poetry.

The Washington Prize is a blind judging. We read manuscripts without identifying information and if one of our readers or judges recognizes the work, that reader or judge recuses him- or herself.

The final judges comprise a panel of five poets, some of whom are members of The Word Works editorial board with at least one judge who did not participate the year before or is new to the prize. This ensures that we do not pick the same kind of manuscript year after year. In fact, The Word Works prides itself on being open to any style of poetry and on any subject. We are just looking for the best manuscript.

WHO HAS WON THE WASHINGTON PRIZE?

The Word Works has been awarding this prize since 1981. The first seven years, the prize was $1000 for a single poem that we published in a full-page ad in Poets & Writers Magazine. Our first seven winners were Barbara Goldberg, Susan Gubernat, Judith Steinbergh, Lindsay Knowlton, Enid Shomer, Renée Ashley, and Lisa Ress. Each of these poets went on to publish a book of poetry if not multiple books.

In 1987, the prize moved to book publication. The first book published in the Washington Prize imprint was Stalking the Florida Panther by the prolific and highly successful Enid Shomer. Stalking the Florida Panther was her first full-length book of poetry. The title of her book was also the title of the winning poem in 1985. Consider these lines from that Washington Prize-winning poem, “What I know:/ that desire spreads like light/ without doctrine.”

1988, the first official year of the Washington Prize as a book contest, the Word Works judges selected a funky page-turner by Christopher Bursk. His original title was replaced with The Way Water Rubs Stone. The book rapidly sold out to his already established following. After all, this was his fourth book with his first—Standing Watch—having been published by Houghton Mifflin in 1978. The Way Water Rubs Stone dared to tackle questions about masculinity and homosexuality in a time when these subjects were just barely seeing the light of day. In the poem "Dorks, Nerds, Wimps," Bursk relates conversations with his son that let it all hang out: "My children laugh when I tell them/ how in fifth grade I was voted best girl./ My sons howl in delight, knowing/ they’re nothing like their father."

With the launch of B. K. Fischer's St. Rage's Vault at the Associated Writing Programs (AWP) Bookfair in March 2013, Word Works counts 26 books in the Washington Prize imprint. St. Rage's Vault is an all ekphrastic set of poems that detail from inception to conception the birth of a child real or imagined. One of the poems scans two pages. Except for the endnotes, a reader would not know each poem was inspired by a work of art. Here are the last lines: “Hewn from darkness,/
the minutes rise as you open///your hand to touch the ladder H/ and spin it sideways into I.”

Every book in the Washington Prize imprint is a carefully sculpted gem. The author gets 15 percent of the print run, which has often results in the author receiving 150 books as his or her royalty payment. Additionally, Word Works provides 30 review copies and helps the author distribute these copies. Some Washington Prize authors like Fred Marchant, author of Tipping Point, go into second editions. For a complete list of Washington Prize winners, visit our webpage at WordWorksBooks.org.

We urge you to give serious consideration to sending your carefully developed poetry manuscript to the Washington Prize and come talk to us at AWP Booth 708 if you plan to attend this year’s conference in Boston. Deadline is March 15 by Electronic submission or postmark.

Goethe Time Shadows at Cafe Muse

So much for August being a slow month.

Cafe Muse hosted Goethe Institute's Time Shadows translation project that featured poems by by local poets Sunil Freeman, Brian Gilmore, Rod Jellema, and Fred Joiner. As Lane Jennings, the moderator for this unusual program that brings together German, Chinese, and English translators and poets, explained, all the poems selected were aired in three different languages. German poet Brigitte Struzyk and Chinese poet Yi Lei were also represented in this program. We were pleased to have the participation of Goethe Institute Director Wilfried Eckstein and Lihong Wang.





Here for example is the first stanza of Brian Gilmore's poem "Chocolate City Blues":

sugar mama i met in the wee wee hours;
was it ten years ago
or was it thirty days?

Zucker Mama traf ich in den frühen Morgenstunden
War’s vor zehn Jahren
Oder waren’s dreißig Tage?

亲爱的，某天深夜我与你相识
那是十年以前
还是三十天以前？

The Goethe Institute website explains:

Here, Brian Gilmore (a native Washingtonian poet currently teaching at the University of Michigan College of Law) takes a 20th century form of song—the blues—and tells an all-too-familiar story just a little differently. In this glimpse of “love-gone wrong,” for once it is the man who is left waiting for the phone call that never comes, while the “sugar mama” he adores has gone and left him empty in every way. 

Cafe Muse Co-director Laura Golberg wanted to know how one translated such slang as "hoochie coochie man"? Read about the project and see the poems and their translations to discover how the translator handled such challenges.

The Cafe Muse program, which also included a tribute to the late Ernie Wormwood (delivered by her daughter Sydney Sgambato and poet Kathi Wolfe), played before a house of nearly 40 people. Paul Hopper, participating in the open mic, also offered a moving poem by Ernie. 

Celebrating Poets at Rock Creek Nature Center

Join The Word Works for its final 2012 Joaquin Miller Poetry Series program featuring

Brandel France de Bravo, author of Provenance

Barbara Goldberg, translator of Moshe Dor's Scorched by the Sun

Mark Smith-Soto, author of Our Lives Are Rivers

Sunday, July 22 at 3 pm

Rock Creek Nature Center
5200 Glover Road NW
Washington DC

202 895-6070

It has been an outstanding season of poetic voices. See images on our Facebook page.

Highlights of our 2012 programs included presentation of

2012 Jacklyn Potter Young Poets Zachary Fine & Ariana Yeatts-Lonske with Elizabeth Arnold

2010 Washington Prize winner Brad Richard

Many other accomplished poets from near and far were featured and also shared in our open mic.

Come help us celebrate the close of this 37th season of poetry!

Big Success!—Joaquin Miller Poetry Series Opening Program

The spirits of Joaquin Miller, Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg, and Jacklyn Potter were vibrating in the auditorium of the Rock Creek Nature Center where The Word Works with Rosemary Winslow as host opened the first of eight programs in the 2012 Joaquin Miller Poetry Series.

Mel Belin gave the traditional reading of Miller’s well-known poem “Columbus” with the backdrop being a projected image of the lush green landscape of the beloved cabin where our programs took place annually for 35 years.

Ehud Sela had all the poems he read projected on that same screen much to the approval of the audience who appreciated that extra sensory experience. Karren Alenier suggested that the audience might like to ask a few questions of this Florida-based veterinarian who write formal poetry.  One question was did he every write about his work with animals because the poems he selected for this reading dealt with cityscapes of Washington, DC and San Francisco.

For Susan Okie, we asked Ranger Scott to bring up the house lights so she better see her poems that included her life as a medical doctor and a wife and mother living in Kenya for several years.

The open reading included a tribute poem by Paul Hopper to our late Miller Cabin Poetry Director Jacklyn Potter, a performance poem about Allen Ginsberg, a civil war poem about Walt Whitman as a battle field nurse, a villanelle by Barbara Orten who was giving a villanelle reading at the Writer’s Center in Bethesda directly after this program (Susan Okie also presented a villanelle in her reading as tribute to Barbara going the extra mile to attend Susan’s Miller Poetry reading—we love how connected Susan was and how her reading also brought in Pamela Murray Winters who will read June 24).

Over 20 people attended the program and everyone agreed the new space was intimate and the acoustics perfect!

The next program is Sunday, June 10 and features University of Maryland professor Elizabeth Arnold with our Jacklyn Potter Young Poets Zachary Fine and Ariana Yeatts-Lonske.

Poem by Mike White on Poetry Daily

"Buying My First Suit" from the 2011 Washington Prize-winning book How to Make a Bird with Two Hands by Mike White was published on the Poetry Daily website May 27, 2012.

Originally from Montreal, Mike lives and teaches in Salt Lake City, Utah. Bird is his first book and The Word Works proudly launched it in Chicago during the 2012 Associated Writing Programs (AWP) Bookfair and Convention.