I’m pleased to announce here the talented winners of the 2nd annual Aspiring Canadian Poets Contest:
1st prize: Natalia Darie
2nd prize: Whitney Sweet
3rd prize: Bria Lubiens
Contest judge Shannon Bramer selected the winning entries and will mentor these promising poets, who will split $1,000 in prize money toward online private instruction. Winners’ names will also be announced in the November issue of Quill & Quire.
My interview with 1st-prize winner Natalia Darie will appear on this website in coming weeks. (Meanwhile, here’s my conversation with the young poet who took last year’s top prize, Ana Rodriguez Machado.)
The Aspiring Canadian Poets Contest is the vision of Heidi Stock, founder and president of Aspiring Canadian Writers Contests Inc., and its honorary patron is memoirist, novelist, and Vancouver poet laureate Evelyn Lau. Poet Catherine Graham kicked off last year’s competition as inaugural judge and mentor.
Congratulations to this year’s winners.
You can read their poems here.
♦ ♦ ♦
And …
if you’re an aspiring songwriter, take note (pun intended) of the just-announced Singer-Songwriter Mentor Experience, which will take submissions starting October 8, 2013.
Visit the Singer-Songwriter Mentor Experience website, and read more about the contest here: “Unsigned singer-songwriters compete for mentoring opportunity with multiple Juno Award–winning artist.” The 2014 mentor is Canadian recording artist Luba. This contest is sponsored by Aspiring Canadian Writers Contests Inc., and supported by the Songwriters Association of Canada.
Entries are being accepted between October 8, 2013 and December 22, 2013, or until 300 eligible entries are received.