Submissions for the 2014 Hollick Arvon Caribbean Writers Prize, which will be awarded to an emerging writer of literary non-fiction, will close on September 30.
Literary non-fiction works can include biography, memoir, travel writing, history, current affairs and non-academic essays on diverse subjects.
The prize, administered by the Bocas Lit Fest and worth a total of US$15,000, will give the winning Caribbean-based writer time to advance a work in progress, a release from the Bocas Lit Fest said.
It also includes a year’s mentoring by an established author and travel to the United Kingdom to attend a one-week intensive creative writing course of their choice at Arvon.
According to the release, the winning writer will also have three days in London to network with literary professionals hosted by the UK’s leading creative writing organisation, Arvon, in association with Free World Centre and agents Rogers, Colderidge & White, and receive a cash award of 3,000 GBP or US$4,500.
“The deadline is imminent but there is still a little time to get entries in,” Bocas Lit Fest founder Marina Salandy-Brown was quoted as saying in the release. To qualify, writers must simply be of Caribbean birth or citizenship, aged over 18, living in the region, and not yet have published a non-fiction work.
Salandy-Brown noted that 2,000 words of the work in progress are required as well as another previously published piece of the same length and genre. Full details are on the website.
The release went on to say that the winner will be announced at the 2014 NGC Bocas Lit Fest, Trinidad and Tobago’s annual literary festival, in April in Port of Spain.
The release added that this year’s inaugural prize for fiction turned up some fine writers from all over the Caribbean and organisers are expecting another exciting crop of new and nearly new writers to emerge.
