About Winning Competitons (an opinion)

[David Campbell]

Stephen's right, Neville, don't get too hung up on the length of poems. Mal won the 2012 Rolf Boldrewood (which has a maximum of 80 lines) with a poem that was only 20 lines long. And my own Unspoken Words, which was in the last issue of the magazine...a poem about love and loss, incidentally...is 40 lines. The Coal Creek competition, which has an entry deadline of 26/09, has an open poetry section with a limit of 20 lines. I picked up a second prize there with a rhyming poem a few years ago. If you reckon you've written something good then why not submit it somewhere, whatever the length? A judge who has just ploughed through several acres of tedious verse might be very happy to find something short and sweet!

I was also prohibited from entering last year's Bryan Kelleher Award, as was Shelley Hansen, because we filled the minor placings in 2012. A strange decision, which Catherine has quite rightly criticised via the pages of the Henry Lawson Society magazine. And entry to the Bryan Kelleher was free, so it's a real loss...it was sponsored by Australian Unity.

David

[Stephen Whiteside]

I didn't realise so many people had incurred the wrath of the BKA organisers.

$1,000 is about the top prize money for a bush poetry comp. Perhaps there's something around the $1500 mark, I'm not sure. However, most major literary comps are ten times that, and some are one hundred times that, which says everything about the status of bush verse in today's society.

[David Campbell]

$1000 was the top money but, with the BKA gone, the best now (as far as I know) is the Ipswich Poetry Feast at $600.

But in the field of open (read "free verse") comps you'll find (among others) the Bruce Dawe at $2,500, the Blake at $5,000, the Josephine Ulrick at $10,000, and the University of Canberra at $15,000. I know all about "art for art's sake" but is there anyone out there who'd knock back several thousand dollars for writing a poem? The University of Canberra competition has a line limit of 50. Win that one by writing to the limit and you're earning at the rate of $300 per line. Small wonder that these competitions, relatively small compared to the Prime Minister's and Premier's Award, still drag in a lot of entries and the attendant publicity. The dark side has its attractions!

Cheers
David

[manfredvijars]

Yes Stephen, ironic that. ....

I love rhyme and metre and pursue this stuff up all sorts of alleyways.
Interestingly, Elisabeth Barrett Browning gave a great discorse on poetry and what poets should write about in ...

AURORA LEIGH
A POEM
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Published in 1864
(From Book Five)

Nay, if there's room for poets in the world
A little overgrown, (I think there is)
Their sole work is to represent the age,
Their age, not Charlemagne's,–this live, throbbing age,
That brawls, cheats, maddens, calculates, aspires,
And spends more passion, more heroic heat,
Betwixt the mirrors of its drawing-rooms,
Than Roland with his knights, at Roncesvalles.

(Yep in boring old iambic pentameter - popular in its day) ...

[Gary Harding]

For what it's worth I would agree with David Campbell entirely.

I was just googling the Prime Minister's Literary Award and naturally delved into the poetry section. Was amazed to see a first prize of $80,000 and when a typical sample was publicly provided openly for comment on the government website in .pdf... I could not believe it. Staggering. Even when quoting part of it here I did not feel comfortable, due to the language.. but that's just me.

A friend of mine who has no literary claim to fame other than having a sane and sensible approach to everything in this world, read it and uttered one word.

"Drivel".

Mind you it is only one insignificant person's frank opinion. Not worth much perhaps.

He says it is a pity there is not a category somewhere between Poetry and Prose... maybe Prosetry... to accommodate people who suffer from whatever medical malady it is that causes them to write pure nonsense. Stephen may shed some light on this being in the medical field. Is there such a disease?

My friend also says it is just an exercise in vote-chasing. I agree. For every one traditional poet there are likely to be forty airy-fairy poetry writers. After all, writing with strict rules is infinitely more difficult than writing down any rubbish that comes into your head.

So you are a politician with $80,000 to spend. Whose vote are you going to chase and buy? Why the forty nincompoops of course!! "Yes Minister, of course its poetic humbug and nonsense, you are quite right, but even crazy people vote, you represent them, so think of it as representing their interests, never vote-chasing. Much nicer."

It is a pity Patterson could not judge and present this PM's Poetry Award.

Now before I am jumped on for misspelling Patterson, I am talking about Sir Les Patterson KCB. Yes.. who better than Australia's Cultural Attache, and Chairman of the Australian Cheese Board... and honourary doctorate in Australian studies.

Past Member of the Government Select Committee into the High Incidence of Transvestism in the Yartz.

Such qualifications put those (no doubt rigorously) chosen to sit on the current poetry judging panel in the shade. No cosy political connections for Sir Les. No need to take stupid but influential hair-brained poetic wierdos out to dinner at the expense of the poor Australian taxpayer. Just raw and untamed literary ability! A perfect Judge.

Can one imagine what Sir Les might think .... or worse, SAY, when he reads such entries or ramblings!

I could suggest something, but as there are far more creative thinkers than me on this forum, I will leave it to their imaginations....

[Gary Harding]

.. and yes I meant Hair-brained and not Hare-brained, although hare-brained is certainly also applicable to such writers.

Hair-brained is a rare medical condition where the hair starts to grow inward instead of outward until it reaches the brain, where it promptly commences devouring it until there is nothing left. Hence we get the expression.. a no-brainer.

Symptoms include a compulsion to write endless meaningless verbiage and call it Poetry. Also baying at the moon.

Many writers of the type of "poetic" material applauded (and massively remunerated, $80,000) by the Prime Minister suffer from it, but to their credit they have been able to turn it to their financial advantage.

I believe some past and present members of the Judging panel of the Prime Minister's Poetry Award suffer from being hair-brained and I guess that excuses their erratic behaviour.

I could name names, but Australia's strict Privacy Laws prevent it.

Sir Les Patterson on Award Winning PM Poetry : "Cripes, ladies and gentlemen. I read this poetry book and you know I just loved it. Did not understand a word of it.. but I LOVED it!"

Anyhow back on topic.... Traditional Bush Poetry Competitions with strict rules or guidelines for writing should be supported and those who run them appreciated, even if governments and their ignorant lackeys don't... in my opinion. For those who manage to win them on a regular basis Well Done and keep writing... especially young people who form the talent pool for Australia's (real) Poets of the future.

[Neville Briggs]

Back in the 1930s there was an art exhibition put on in Berlin by Joseph Goebbels and approved by Hitler.
It was a display of modern art and called Degenerate Art. It was supposed to allow the people to see, scoff and jeer at the work of those who were obviously mentally deranged and/or morally void.
Now though, it is Adolph and Joseph who are judged to be mentally deranged and morally void. The artists and works they despised are seen as pioneering works of German Expressionism.

Just a passing thought on how we judge artistic intent.

[Mal McLean]

I want to thank you all for getting my poetry juices flowing. I was getting quite disheartened...pissed off really.....and here I find many writing what I have been too lazy to verbalize.

There will have to be change. I think we all realize that and discussions like this will lead us there.

I have been long of the view that we need to find a way to work closely with the contemporary poetry organisations so that our art appears, if not exactly alongside, in a way associated with the main stream. On the occasions I have raised this I have been scoffed at and derided. But what if we could get the minor category of formal poetry included in one of the major contemporary verse prizes? After all, organisations like FAWNS have dual categories. Perhaps we need to put some prize money up ourselves? And then there is the question of who judges. I think we have all seen the results of contemporary poets judging formal poetry.

In any event every journey starts with that first step.....

Mal

[Gary Harding]

I agree Mal... all very true.

However from a purely personal perspective my sole task these days is to write and not to champion causes, even if in this case it is very noble. I hope someone else picks up on it. I wish them luck!

If it was somebody else's $80,000 being handed over I could not care what they do with it.... it's their business. However as a taxpayer it is MY money being handed over, so I naturally take a huge interest and put it under the microscope.. as I have a complete right to do..

http://arts.gov.au/sites/default/files/ ... xcerpt.pdf

In the case of Govt Awards, the numbers are vastly against us and change. It is a closed shop.

As I have said before equally as stridently, the corridors of Canberra, and The Yartz at a State level too, have been thoroughly infiltrated by nonsense-writers for decades. (With the possible exception of good people at the Mitchell Library and Vic State Library.) That is not going to change in my lifetime. I have previously described the Judge in the C.J. Dennis Poetry Award in Victoria who in her great Wisdom called Henry Lawson "a drunkard". (Didn't Henry Lawson write a forward for Den's book?)

What hope have you got when people like that occupy positions like that and make those statements?

Absolutely none.

How do they swing those (paid) positions? No prizes for guessing..

Politicians just sign anything put in front of them and so they are useless.

In the end I get enormous enjoyment from savagely ripping into these people. Ridiculing them. Making them look like the self-important trumped-up fools that they are. It is fun!!!. Certainly I have got my taxpayer dollar worth out of thoroughly taking the mickey out of the idiots now!

Print out the above .pdf text and show it to your friends. See what they say. Ask if it is worth $80,000?? Ask if they understand it. They may well think it is brilliant and I am just a dunce.. but I am betting not. To me poetry is for the people... something everyone can understand without a university degree in English Literature. Not for a select few with INFLUENCE.

The Queensland Premier chopped the whole rotten lot. No more gravy train!! Good for him!

I could talk on for ages about the subject.... but rather than take it seriously I prefer to poke fun at the whole Govt Award farce.

One day some astute journo will pick up on it and say..." Pensions for Aussies Slashed while Money handed over for Drivel".

Their time is coming, I am certain..... and I look forward to that day.