The Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025 is currently open for submission. The competition is open till the 15th of January at midnight BST.
The Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025
The Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025 is currently open for submission. The competition is open till the 15th of January at midnight BST.
About the Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025
The Bournemouth Writing Prize is an annual international short story and poetry competition. Winners of this writing contest receive personal feedback from industry professionals and there is a cash prize for each category.
Your work will be judged by industry professionals from the publishing world.
Run by the staff and students of the MA in Creative Writing and Publishing at Bournemouth University the competition is entering its ninth year. To help the prize continue to grow and reach new audiences, we are proud to partner with The Bournemouth Writing Festival. April 2025 will see the winners and anthology edited and published by the Dorset-based indie publisher Dithering Chaps.
This year’s entrants will also be considered for inclusion in the inaugural issues of the new Bournemouth Journal launching in 2025.
Categories for the Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025
Short Story
- Word count: Maximum 3000 words (excluding title).
- What we are looking for: You can choose whatever style and topic you want! We want passionate storytellers who create great compelling characters and tell fascinating stories.
Poetry
- Up to three poems. Line count: Maximum 30 per poem (excluding title and line spaces).
- What we are looking for: You can choose whatever form and theme works best for you! We’re looking for fresh and unexpected poems – be that about recent world events, stories of hope, or based on personal experience. You may send up to three poems per entry. All poems need to be submitted at the same time in the same document.
The Prizes
Short Story
£500 cash prize, plus an hour-long consultation with our short story judge, Greene and Heaton agent, Laura Williams.
Poetry
£500 cash prize, plus an hour-long consultation and feedback session with our poetry judges, indie publisher Dithering Chaps.
For both categories:
The winners will each have 2 free tickets and an Open Mic slot of up to 10 minutes at the Bourn Jammy event on Saturday 26th April at the Pavilion Dance, where the band will improvise music to their winning entry.
The Short Story winner will need to truncate their entry to fit into the timeframe. Winners must make their own travel and accommodation arrangements, and meet any associated costs.
Each of the overall winners will receive 2 free tickets to any talk or workshop taking place at the Pavilion Dance over the course of the three-day festival.
Each winner selected for the anthology will receive a free, printed copy of the resulting anthology.
Prizes are non-transferable and no alternative (cash or otherwise) will be given.
Other Writing Competitions Open for Submissions
- Kelpies Prize for Writing 2025 | Deadline: February 28, 2025
- Margery Allingham Short Mystery Competition 2025 | Deadline: February 28, 2025
- The Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025 | Deadline: January 15, 2025
- New2theScene Poetry Competition 2024 | Deadline: December 1, 2024
- The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 | Deadline: November 30, 2024
- Anthology Travel Writing Competition 2024 | Deadline: November 30, 2024.
- Anthology Short Story Competition 2025 | Deadline: July 31, 2025
- Anthology Flash Fiction Competition | Deadline: September 30, 2025
How To Enter The Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025
The entry fee is $10. Entering is a two-step process:
- Pay using the Eventbrite link you can find here. This will generate a unique registration code.
- Email your entry to us, attaching it as a separate Word document to your entry email, without your name on it. In the body of the email include your name and the order number that came along with your Eventbrite receipt.
Entries for the Bournemouth Writing Prize will also be considered for publication in the Bournemouth Journal.
Terms and Conditions for the Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025
Please read the Terms and Conditions below carefully before entering. By submitting an entry, you are agreeing to these Terms and Conditions. The competition is being run by Bournemouth University (‘BU’).
- Closing date for receipt of entries is 15th January 2025 at midnight GMT. All entries received after this deadline will be automatically disqualified.
- Entries for the Bournemouth Writing Prize will also be considered for publication in the Bournemouth Journal.
- The Bournemouth Writing Prize is open to writers everywhere over the age of 16 (entrants must be over 16 years old on the closing date).
- Any students and staff currently working on the Bournemouth Writing Prize and/or the Bournemouth Journal are ineligible to submit.
- All entries should be in English.
- There are no specific formatting requirements (font type, font size, line spacing, etc.). Writers may format their work in the way they feel is most appropriate.
- The maximum length of submissions for the short story category is 3,000 words (does not include title); there is no minimum length. The stories may be literary or genre-based (Crime, Horror, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Historical, Romance, Children’s, etc.). For the poetry category, up to three poems per submission, a maximum of 30 lines each; there is no minimum length. The poem may be in any form the poet chooses.
- Authors may enter the competition as many times as they like, upon payment of the entry fee of £10.
- Entries will not be returned. Please keep a copy. No corrections or alterations can be made after receipt of an entry. BU will not accept responsibility if contact details provided are incomplete or inaccurate; or for competition entries that are lost, mislaid, damaged or delayed in transit.
- Entries must be entirely the work of the entrant. Any entry found to have been plagiarised will be disqualified. Entries must not infringe the rights of any other party. BU accepts no responsibility if entrants fail to comply with these Terms and Conditions and entrants agree to indemnify BU against any claim by any third party from any breach of these Terms and Conditions.
- Entries must not contain defamatory, obscene, offensive or any other unsuitable material.
- Submissions simultaneously submitted to other writing competitions are welcome – but please let us know as soon as possible if a story/poem is to be published elsewhere or has won a prize in another writing competition. In such instances, the entrant’s work will be withdrawn from the Bournemouth Writing Prize. Unfortunately, we are unable to refund the entrance fee.
- Entries will be read and judged anonymously by the Panel; entrants’ names and contact details should not appear on the stories/poems. The stories/poems must be free of all personal information about the author. This includes age and address.
- By submitting an entry, entrants agree to have their work edited and published, in both print and e-book formats, should they be the author of one of the stories/poems selected for the Bournemouth Writing Prize anthology. Authors retain worldwide copyright on their work (including film and dramatic rights) but grant the Bournemouth Writing Prize first publication rights to publish their selected story or poem, in both print and e-book formats. The entrant agrees that BU may need to modify entries and may at its sole discretion edit, adapt, abridge or translate the entry.
- No competitor may win more than one prize. Entries will be read by a judging panel of writers/lecturers including MA Creative Writing and Publishing students at Bournemouth University. They will select a longlist for the final judging panel. The judging panel will select their shortlisted stories/poems and the top prize-winning stories/poems. The judges’ decision is final, and no individual correspondence will be entered into. Judges or readers will not comment on individual stories/poems or give feedback on individual stories/poems.
- Prizes are allocated at the discretion of the judges.
- The overall winners will each have 2 free tickets and an Open Mic slot of up to 10 minutes at the Bourn Jammy event on Saturday 26th April at the Pavilion Dance, where the band will improvise music to their winning entry. The Short Story winner will need to truncate their entry to fit into the timeframe. Winners must make their own travel and accommodation arrangements, and any associated costs.
- Each of the overall winners will receive 2 free tickets to any talk or workshop taking place at the Pavillion Dance over the course of the three-day festival.
- Each winner selected for the anthology will receive a free, physical copy of the resulting anthology.
- The two overall winners will receive a consultation with the respective judge for up to an hour over video call, with a time and date to suit both parties.
- Prizes are non-transferable and no alternative (cash or otherwise) will be given.
- Entrants will not be contacted individually about the competition results unless they are selected for the shortlist. The shortlist will be announced on the website. The top prize-winners will be displayed on the BU website. Please see the Privacy Notice below for data protection information.
- We will not be able to refund any withdrawn stories/poems; however, stories/poems may still be withdrawn upon an entrant’s request up to one week after the publication of the shortlist. Please email: bournemouthwritingprize@bournemouth.ac.uk
- Bournemouth University and the Bournemouth Writing Festival reserve the right to use photographs and video of entrants in their publicity materials.
- Entry implies an acceptance of all The Bournemouth Writing Prize Terms and Conditions. Entries that fail to comply with these Terms and Conditions will be disqualified.
- Bournemouth University and the Bournemouth Writing Festival reserve the right to amend these Terms and Conditions if deemed necessary in its opinion to do so.
- Your personal data will be used by BU and the Bournemouth Writing Festival for the purposes of managing and administering the competition. For further data protection information, please see The Bournemouth Writing Prize Privacy Notice at the end of these Terms and Conditions.
- These Terms and Conditions are governed by the laws of England and Wales.
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