And the winners are...
We are delighted to announce that the winners of the 2023 Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize are:
Winner
Brigid Coleridge for 'Day 210'
Runners-up
Chris Andrews for 'Shedload'
Shey Marque for 'Improbable Acts of Proximity'
Highly Commended
Caroline Reid for 'Rhyming Poem'
The 2023 Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize Shortlist
This year's judges were Island's poetry editor, Kate Middleton, Jill Jones and Shastra Deo. Each judge read all submissions 'blind', and after much discussion, came to a collective shortlist of ten poems.
The shortlisted poets/poems are …
Meet Island's new Fiction Editor
We are absolutely thrilled to announce that Jane Rawson has joined the Island team. Jane will be taking on the role of Fiction Editor for the print issues.
Winner of the 2022 Island Nonfiction Prize
I’m thrilled to announce the winner of the 2022 Island Nonfiction Prize: Heather Taylor Johnson’s ‘Selfish Ghosts’.
Nonfiction Prize 2022 Shortlist
We have once again been spoiled for choice! This year’s entrants to the Island Nonfiction Prize were in equal parts powerful, moving, funny, furious and sad, and choosing a shortlist from hundreds of submissions was quite a task.
Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize winners- 2021/22
Our thanks to everyone who supported this year's Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize. We received in excess of 400 entries. The judging panel, comprising Island's poetry editor, Kate Middleton, Ali Alizadeh and Aidan Coleman, judged the competition ‘blind’. Each judge read all submissions, and then, over the course of discussion, came to the collective shortlist of five poems that make up the winner, runner-ups and highly commendeds.
Funding Announcement
On the same day that we go to press with our final issue for 2021, we are delighted to be able to announce that Arts Tasmania has awarded us an organisational grant for 2022. This grant gives us a strong foundation from which to pursue our 2022 planned program.
Island’s Inaugural Nonfiction Prize Winners
In the almost 300 entries we received were a whole range of experiences, communicated in every kind of nonfiction form. As judges, we were fortunate to have the opportunity to read pieces that were funny, devastating, profound, pithy, lyrical and hard. These entries ran the gamut of nonfiction, from traditional essay form to unapologetically experimental, and pure memoir to absolute universal exploration.
Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize winners - 2020/21
At a time when poetry is very much in the news (thanks to Amanda Gorman reciting her powerful poem at Joe Biden's inauguration), we are delighted to announce the winners of the 2020 Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize.
Funding Update
We are delighted to announce that Arts Tasmania has awarded us an organisational grant for 2021. This grant provides us with a solid foundation from which we will pursue the additional revenue necessary to deliver our planned 2021 program.