Knowing what’s on throughout 2016 will help you plan your writing and promotions year. We’re going to keep this list open so that we can add new dates as they become available. If you hear of new dates, contact us so we can add them in.
Festivals to attend
Blak & Bright, Victorian Indigenous Literary Festival (19 – 21 February 2016)
More than 60 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander novelists, storytellers, poets, songwriters, playwrights, academics, comedians, raconteurs and rabble-rousers over three days in Melbourne. Keynotes, performances, workshops, panels and more.
Click here for more information about Blak & Bright Festival.
Festivals to submit
Emerging Writers Festival – Open Artist Callout
The Emerging Writers’ Festival (14 June–24 June 2016) prides itself on being inclusive to everyone in the writing community, of all ages and at all stages of their career. They’re running an open artist call out for writers who’d like to be involved in the sure-to-be-incredible 2016 program. They are looking for interesting ideas about publications, performances, dialogues, panels, debates and workshops. This is open to individual writers, but also writer collectives, emerging publications and performance groups. Projects that consider the public presentation of writing in new ways are of extra interest to them. Whether you see yourself as an artist or audience member, they’d love to hear from you. If you’re successful, they’ll help you refine your idea and pair you with other writers.
Click here for more information about the Emerging Writers Festival.
Next Wave Writers in Residence Program – Call for Applications
Writers in Residence is Next Wave’s learning and development program for emerging critical and creative writers who identify as having disability. This program provides outstanding mentoring, learning opportunities and practical experience for writers who want to receive feedback and develop new skills through workshops and engagement with a variety of art forms in Next Wave Festival 2016. In partnership with Writers Victoria, Next Wave’s ‘Writers in Residence’ program offers five workshops (one per month from January to May 2016) with guest speakers from the writing and arts industry, and one-on-one mentoring from a Critical Peer. The participant will also attend Next Wave Festival events as well as studio visits and work-in-progress showings by Festival artists.
Click here for more information about the Next Wave Writers-in-Residence Program.
Noted Festival – Call for Artists, Curators and Indie Publishers
In March 2015, Noted staged Canberra’s first writers’ festival in five years. Over five days, at almost thirty free events spanning live, digital and professional development formats, Noted welcomed and paid over sixty emerging and experimental writers, editors, publishers and artists for the benefit of over 1,000 attendees. Applications to feature as a festival artist have officially opened, and Noted is actively seeking locals, interstaters, internationals, fiction and nonfiction writers, poets, editors, publishers, culturally and linguistically diverse creators, illustrators, and performers. If you want to run a workshop, conduct an online narrative experiment, collaborate in an art exhibition, or simply step forward and put your hand up because you just plain done write good, Noted welcomes your application. This year, Noted Festival is excited to also offer a professional development opportunity for an innovative and reliable exhibition curator. Additionally, Noted are seeking independent publishers who wish to hold a stall at their Independent Publishing Fair, to be held at Gorman Arts Centre during the festival.
Click here for more information about Noted Festival.
Prizes
Nita B Kibble Literary Awards for Women Writers – (Entries NOW open)
Amongst some of Australia’s most prestigious awards for women writers, the Nita B Kibble Literary Awards (the Kibble Awards) aim to encourage Australian women writers to improve and advance literature for the benefit of our community. The Awards recognise the works of women writers of fiction or non-fiction classified as ‘life writing’. This includes novels, autobiographies, biographies, literature and any writing with a strong personal element.The Kibble Literary Award recognises the work of an established Australian woman writer while the Dobbie Literary Award recognises a first published work from an Australian woman writer.
Click here for more information about the Nita B Kibble Literary Award.
Rhonda Jankovic Literary Awards
Entries may be poems or short stories on the theme of social justice. Poems to be no more than 50 lines; stories no more than 2,500 words. A fee of AUD$5.00 is applied to each item entered. First prize for each section is $600.
Click here for more information about the Rhonda Jankovic Literary Award.
Field of Words Spring Writing Competition
Flash fiction and short story entries welcome. Field of Words is dedicated to helping emerging writers grow. All entrants must be aged 18 and over. Both categories offer cash prizes for the winner and runner-up. Monthly finalists posted on the FoW website.
Click here for more information about the Field of Words Spring Writing Competition.
Narrative Magazine’s Fall Contest
The Narrative Magazine Fall Contest is open to both fiction and nonfiction pieces. Entries may be up to 15,000 in length and must be previously unpublished. First prize is $2,500, second prize is $1,000, third prize is $500, and up to ten finalists will receive $100 each. All entries will be considered for publication.
Click here for more information about the Narrative Magazine’s Fall Contest.
Fish Publishing International Short Story Prize
Fish Publishing International Short Story Prize is for stories up to 5,000 words. First prize is €3,000 (€1,000 of which is for travel expenses to the launch of the anthology). Second prize is a week at the Anam Cara Writers’ & Artists’ Retreat. Ten short stories will be published in the 2016 Fish Anthology.
Click here for more information about the Fish Publishing International Short Story Prize.
Story Wine Prize (2016 Dates TBC)
This competition aims to discover the finest in original short fiction up to 800 words in length.
Click here for more information about Overland’s Story Wine Prize.
National Indigenous Arts Awards (2016 Dates TBC)
The National Indigenous Arts Awards were established in 2007 to recognise and celebrate the outstanding work and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. These prestigious national awards consist of the Red Ochre and the Dreaming Award.
Click here for more information about the Australia Council’s National Indigenous Arts Awards.
Queensland Literary Awards (2016 Dates TBC)
The Queensland Literary Awards celebrate and promote outstanding Australian writers.
Click here for more information about the Queensland Literary Awards.
V.S Pritchett Memorial Prize (2016 Dates TBC)
This prize was founded by the RSL at the beginning of the new millennium to commemorate the centenary of an author widely regarded as the finest English short-story writer of the 20th century, and to preserve a tradition encompassing Pritchett’s mastery of narrative.
Click here for more information about the V.S Pritchett Memorial Prize.