2012 November PAD Chapbook Challenge: Guidelines
I've been putting off announcing the upcoming poem-a-day chapbook challenge until I can announce the results of the April challenge, but it's looking like that will be pushing up against the end of the month. What can I say? I've just been blessed with an abundance of things to do.
Anyway, I'm so excited that we'll be jumping into a new poem-a-day challenge. This post is intended to give people an idea of what to expect from the challenge.
Here are the basics of the challenge:
- Beginning on November 1 (Atlanta, Georgia time), I will share a prompt and poem each day of November on this blog.
- Poets are then challenged to write a poem each day (no matter where you live on the planet) within 24 hours (or so) from when the prompt is posted.
- Poets do NOT have to register anywhere to participate. In fact, poets don't even need to post to this blog to be considered participants.
- The Challenge will unofficially conclude around 24 hours after the final prompt is posted. That said...
- This Challenge is unique, because I expect poets to take all the material they've written in November and create a chapbook manuscript during the month of December. (Yes, you can revise material, and yes, the chapbook should be composed mostly of poems written for the challenge--I'm using the honor system.)
- Poets have until 11:59 p.m. (Atlanta, GA time) on January 7, 2013, to submit a manuscript that can be 10-20 pages in length (not including table of contents, title page, etc.) with no more than one poem per page. So if you wrote 50 poems in November, you have to narrow them down to the best 20 (or even fewer). Submit manuscripts to robert.brewer@fwmedia.com with the subject line: 2012 November PAD Chapbook Challenge. (The subject line is very important.)
- The goal will be to announce a winning manuscript by Groundhog Day 2013.
What do poets get out of this challenge? If nothing else, they get several new poems, but I've heard plenty of success stories over the years from poets who have gone on to publish individual poems from these challenges and even complete collections (mostly inspired by the challenges).
Plus, the winner gets recognized on this blog, along with many honorable mentions. That's a good thing.
But the best part, I think, is that poets who share their poems in the comments of each post create a community that lives beyond the actual challenge. That's incredibly important for the lonely poet.
Speaking of comments, I've been made aware of problems with commenting on the Poetic Asides blog by some poets. Technological hiccups like these are the reason why I don't make it mandatory for poets to post on the blog to participate. However, I believe one common reason behind this problem is when people spend a long time typing their comment. Sooo... I'd recommend typing your poem in Word (or something similar) before pasting your poem in the comments. Hopefully, this will help.
If you have any additional questions, shoot them to me in the comments.
I can't wait to see everyone in November.
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