Write now! Deadline for UofT School of Continuing Studies writing competition is almost here
“Geheime Korrespondenz,” by Carl von Bergen, 1891 (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Friday, May 24, 2013.
That’s the deadline for submissions to this year’s Random House of Canada Student Award for Fiction.
If you were enrolled in a course offered by the Creative Writing Program at University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies between May 15, 2012 and May 15, 2013 (today!), YOU’RE ELIGIBLE.
Wednesday, May 15th, 2013
Memoir of Growing Up Black in 1950s: 1st Runner-up
Lynette Dathorne, age 12
Toronto-based writer Lynette Dathorne’s story “Scenes from My Youth,” an excerpt from her memoir-in-progress, has been named first runner-up in the Nonfiction category of the annual OASIS Journal anthology competition in Tucson, Arizona. “Scenes from My Youth” will be Lynette’s first published story.
“The year was 1953,” she says, “and the focus of my submission was on my family leaving British Guiana for London, England, when I was thirteen years old and my experiences at school when I arrived. The major theme of my memoir is what it was like growing up in London as a black girl during the fifties and sixties.”
Monday, September 26th, 2011
CBC’s Canada Writes Autobiography Challenge
A compelling title and back-cover blurb for a real memoir-in-progress by Mary E. McIntyre is featured as one of Today’s Picks in the entertaining CBC Canada Writes Autobiography Challenge.
Read her submission here.
Mary’s surprised and delighted that her entry is being highlighted. Along with other entrants, she’s in the running for the prize: an iPad2.
The Canada Writes Autobiography Challenge encourages you to send in a title (5 words maximum) and a cover blurb (50 words maximum) for your life story. Your entry must be received by September 2 at noon ET, and the winner will be announced on September 12.
Here’s what CBC says about its challenge:
“Would your autobiography be a heartbreaking work of staggering genius? Would it be about roughing it in the bush, or travels by night? Would it maintain a sense of the ridiculous?
“We want to know all about you. No CVs or boring lists of accomplishments – make it intriguing, funny and irresistible. Would the back-cover blurb be full of glowing quotes about your excellent Boggle and Martini-mixing skills? Would it tease readers with an anecdote about that infamous hang-gliding incident?”
Give it a try. In 50 words or less, what’s your story?
Click Today’s Picks to read more. For Rules and Regulations, and to submit your entry, visit Canada Writes Autobiography Challenge.
Mary E. McIntyre is a past student and has attended two of my writers’ retreats. She blogs at Washburn Island: Memoir of a Childhood.
Saturday, August 27th, 2011
Tilya Gallay Helfield’s memoir “Blink” garners prize
Tilya Helfield of Toronto, Canada, recently earned first prize in the non-fiction category of the 2010 OASIS Journal competition for her short memoir “Blink.” Tilya’s story will appear in the most recent edition of OASIS Journal, an annual anthology that showcases creative writing by international writers age 50 and over. It’s published by Tucson, Arizona-based Imago Press.
The ninth annual edition of OASIS is also the largest so far, at more than 400 pages. Imago Press publisher Leila Joiner received a total of 60 fiction entries, 92 non-fiction, and 272 poems, from which she selected the most promising pieces to be sent on for blind-judging—by Robert Longoni (Fiction), Dan Gilmore (Poetry), and me (Non-fiction). Of the 92 non-fiction entries, most of them memoir, less than half went on to the second level of judging.
Thursday, November 11th, 2010
