Wells Festival Of Literature's Open Poetry Competition 2022

We are delighted to announce that the 1st prize in our Open Poetry Competition will again this year be £1000! Wells Festival Of Literature 2022

Open Poetry Competition 2022

This year we welcome Tristram Fane Saunders to our 30th Anniversary Festival as judge in the Open Poetry Competition.

Tristram Fane Saunders is a journalist and commissioning editor at the Telegraph.  As their poetry critic he also runs ‘Poem of the Week’.

His own poems appear in Carcanet’s New Poetries VIII: An Anthology.  His current pamphlet is Woodsong and The Rake is forthcoming in May 2022. He has recently edited Edna St Vincent Millay: Poems and Satires.

We are delighted to announce that the 1st prize in our Open Poetry Competition will again this year be £1000! Second and third prizes will also remain at £500 and £250 respectively. Plus £100 for a local poet.

Our International Competitions will open on 1 April 2022, closing at midnight on 30 June 2022. 

Prizes for all four competitions will be presented on Monday 17 October 2022 during the Festival.  

This special occasion is one of the highlights of the Festival when, for the first time, the winning writers are revealed and rewarded.

Open Poetry Competition 2022 Rules

You have read, understood and agreed to the WFL Competition Terms and Conditions.

• The fee for each separate entry is £6. Competitors may submit any number of entries.
• All entries must be anonymous. Do not include your name or contact details in the file title. Your name and contact details are recorded via a form.
• Type your entry 1.5 or double-spaced text.
• Put the title and page number on each page of each entry.
• Poems may be on any subject.
• Poems must not exceed 35 lines of text in length.
• Add the line count to the top right of the first page.
• Save the file as a Microsoft Word Document or a PDF.
• The file name should be the title of the poem only, typed exactly the same as the document, for example: I wandered Lonely as a Cloud
• Do not put Wells Entry, my Poetry entry etc in the file title.
• For untitled pieces, save the document with the first line of the poem.

Submit