2009 Many Mountains Moving Press Poetry Book Prize Update | 2009 Guidelines | 2008 Book Prize Results | 2007 Book Prize Results |Visit MMM Press
The 2009 Many Mountains Moving Press Poetry Book Prize Judge is Martìn Espada
Called “the Latino poet of his generation” and “the Pablo Neruda of North American authors,” Martín Espada was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1957. He has published sixteen books in all as a poet, editor, essayist and translator, including two collections of poems last year: Crucifixion in the Plaza de Armas (Smokestack, 2008), released in England, and La Tumba de Buenaventura Roig (Terranova, 2008), a bilingual edition published in Puerto Rico. The Republic of Poetry, a collection of poems published by Norton in 2006, received the Paterson Award for Sustained Literary Achievement and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Another collection, Imagine the Angels of Bread (Norton, 1996), won an American Book Award and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Other books of poetry include Alabanza: New and Selected Poems (Norton, 2003), A Mayan Astronomer in Hell’s Kitchen (Norton, 2000), City of Coughing and Dead Radiators (Norton, 1993), and Rebellion is the Circle of a Lover’s Hands (Curbstone, 1990). He has received numerous awards and fellowships, including the Robert Creeley Award, the Antonia Pantoja Award, the Charity Randall Citation, the Paterson Poetry Prize, the Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award, the National Hispanic Cultural Center Literary Award, the Premio Fronterizo, two NEA Fellowships, the PEN/Revson Fellowship and a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship. His poems have appeared in the The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review, Harper’s, The Nation and The Best American Poetry. He has also published a collection of essays, Zapata’s Disciple (South End, 1998); edited two anthologies, Poetry Like Bread: Poets of the Political Imagination from Curbstone Press (Curbstone, 1994) and El Coro: A Chorus of Latino and Latina Poetry (University of Massachusetts, 1997); and released an audiobook of poetry called Now the Dead will Dance the Mambo (Leapfrog, 2004). His work has been translated into ten languages. A former tenant lawyer, Espada is now a professor in the Department of English at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, where he teaches creative writing and the work of Pablo Neruda.
Prize: The winner receives $1,000 and publication by MMM Press in 2010.
EXTENDED DEADLINE: September 22, 2009 (postmark on the autumn equinox). Printable guidelines
Entry fee: $25
{Entitles first entrants to a free back issue while they last and the opportunity to buy a new MMM Subscription for $10.00, and any of the MMM Press Books, They Sing at Midnight, invisible sister, & Feeding the Fear of the Earth, Silkie, & Ashes in Midair for $10. Please use this order form (second page of printed guidelines) if you want a free back issue or anything else.}
Final Judge: TBA
Eligibility:
• Open to all poets and writers whose work is in English.
• Staff and their family members are not eligible to enter.
• Simultaneous submissions are allowed if the poet agrees to notify MMM
Press of acceptance elsewhere.• Entries may not be previously published, but individual poems and
chapbook-length sections may have been if the previous publisher
gives permission to reprint. (More than half of the ms. may not have
been published as a collection.)
Submission Checklist & NEW email submission guidelines:
• A typed ms. of 50–100 pages of original poetry, single- or double-spaced.
(The author’s name must NOT appear anywhere on the ms.)• A cover letter with the title of the collection, a brief bio, your name,
address, phone number, and e-mail address(es).• Acknowledgments may be included in the ms. but are not required.
• A $25 check or money order payable to Many Mountains Moving Press.
• An SASE for the winner announcement. Mss. will not be returned.
• The order form for contest entrants with a choice of any available free back issue and discounts on subscriptions and books.
(This order form is on the the second page of the printable guidelines.)
Or via e-mail, send an attachment (RTF, Word, WordPerfect or PDF) to editors@mmminc.org without any identification in the ms. itself.
Send a cover letter on paper along with the paper order form to the address below with a check and identification of the ms. etc.
As with any paper submission, mss. will be acknowledged as received as soon as the check and order form arrive.
Send to:
Many Mountains Moving Poetry Book Contest
Jeffrey Ethan Lee, Senior Poetry Editor
Many Mountains Moving Press
1705 Lombard Street
Phila. PA 19146
2009 Poetry Contest Update | 2009 Flash Fiction Update
Congratulations to the winner of the 2009 MMM Flash Fiction Contest, Francisco Q. Delgado!
Francisco Q. Delgado is currently working toward his M.A. in English at Brooklyn College. In 2005, he graduated with a degree in Creative Writing from SUNY New Paltz, where he also won the Vincent Tomaselli Short Story Award. His fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Plain Spoke, Skive, Ghoti Magazine, Boston Literary Magazine, and Underground Voices.
Thanks to everyone who entered the flash fiction contest.The runner up was "Back Seat" by Karin Lin-Greenberg.
The winner and runner up will appear in Vol. X.
Other finalists that may appear in MMM Online are:
"Caught" by Karin Lin-Greenberg
"Shine On You Crazy" by Natalie Serber
The other finalists were:
"Aftermath Fragment" by Kayt Hoch
"FishBird" by Allyn Harker
"Regarding Fairies" by Hannah Grindrod
"Easy Road" by Robin Tiffney
Congratulations to the winner of the 2009 MMM Poetry Contest, Margaret Walther!Margaret Walther is a retired librarian from the Denver metro area and a past president of Columbine Poets, an organization to promote poetry in Colorado. She has taught workshops and has been a guest editor for Buffalo Bones. She has published in many journals, including Connecticut Review, anderbo.com, A cappella Zoo, Fugue and Quarterly West and has poems forthcoming in Nimrod and Naugatuck River Review, where one of her poems has been chosen as a semifinalist in the Narrative Poetry Contest.
Thanks to the final poetry judge, Patricia Smith! (All of the entries were read anonymously.)
The finalist titles in alphabetical order are:Katie by the Sea
Missing Child: Mystic Connecticut
Natural Causes
Nights with Neighbors
Of Daughters and Mothers
Saskia van Uilenburgh, the Wife of the Artist. c. 1613
The semifinalist titles in alphabetical order are:
Esperanto
Halve, Seed
Letter to Hugo from Somewhere, Anywhere
Monkey Spinning a Prayer Wheel
Past Tense
Schrodinger's Mouse
The Art of Dying Well
The Ride
Umbrage
NEW 2009 Poetry & Flash Fiction Contests:
EXTENDED Deadline: Postmark deadline—June 20, 2009.
Winners announced by October, 2009.Eligibility:
* Open to all poets and writers whose work is in English.
* Entries may not be previously or simultaneously published.
* All MMM staff members and family of staff members are ineligible.Prizes:
* $250 cash prize for the best poem & $250 cash prize for the best flash fiction.* Publication in the 2009-2010 MMM print annual.
* Finalists in each genre will also be considered for publication.
Anonymous judging:
* Do not put your name on your work(s). All entries will be read anonymously.
* Include in your cover letter: (i) your name, (ii) e-mail address and phone number(s), (iii) mailing address, & (iv) the title(s) and genre of your submission.
* If you enter in both categories, please send them in separate envelopes.
* Mark “poetry contest” or “fiction contest” on the envelope.
* Mss. cannot be returned; do not send your only copies.
* Include an SASE (self-addressed stamped envelope) to receive the announcement of the winners.
* NEW REQUIREMENT: paper entries must be sent in duplicate.
Entry Fees:
$15 for as many as 5 poems per entry (total submission cannot exceed 10 pages).$15 for as many as 2 flash fictions (or short-short story under 1,000 words, typed double-spaced).
Entrants get a free subscription!
Make checks payable to: Many Mountains Moving.
Final Poetry Judge: Patricia SmithFinal Flash Fiction Judge: Thaddeus Rutkowski
Send to:
Many Mountains Moving
(Poetry or Flash Fiction) Contest
1705 Lombard St.
Phila. PA 19146Or via e-mail, send an attachment (RTF, Word, WordPerfect or PDF) to editors@mmminc.org without any identification in the ms. itself. Then send a paper cover letter along with a check for $15 exactly as you would with a regular paper submission. (See above). Ms. will be acknowledged as received as soon as the check arrives.