White Cross School

Earlier this month we congratulated Katherine Soniat on winning the Poetry Council of North Carolina’s 2011 Oscar Arnold Young Award for the best book of poetry for her collection, The Swing Girl. But the Poetry Council sponsors eight annual awards, granting cash prizes for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place, and publishing the winners in their annual anthology, Bay Leaves.

All 2011 winners have just been announced, and several NCWN members have been honored (in bold, below). All four finalists in the Oscar Arnold Young Award were members; Ross White proved himself a triple threat by seizing first place in three separate categories; and both Alice Osborn and Jane Shlensky were among the finalists in two separate categories.

The complete list of category winners and judges is as follows:

Oscar Arnold Young (book contest):
JUDGE: Paul Hostovsky, Medfield, MA& Ron Moran, Simpsonville, SC
1st The Swing Girl by Katherine Soniat, Asheville, NC
2nd Lie Down with Me by Julie Suk, Charlotte, NC
HM Renderingthe Bones by Susan M. Lefler, Brevard, NC
HM An Innocent in the House of the Dead by Joanna Catherine Scott, Chapel Hill, NC

Gladys Owings Hughes Heritage (freeverse):
JUDGE: Darnell Arnoult, Harrogate, TN
1st “Babies Hurtling Several Stories” by Ross White, Durham, NC
2nd “Daddy Imagines a Good Death” by JS Absher, Raleigh, NC
3rd “The Museum of Broken Things” by Jane Shlensky, Bahama, NC

Charles Shull (traditional poetry):
JUDGE: Paul Bone, Evansville, IN
1st “Facts about Early America” by Ross White, Durham, NC (rhyming couplets)
2nd “Basic Bad Day” by Peg Russell, Murphy, NC (terza rima)
3rd “Featured Reader” by Alice Osborn, Raleigh, NC (sestina)
HM “On aRecent Engagement” by Michael A. Moreno, Rockville, MD (sonnet)
HM “Waterthe Lover” by Ellen Summers, Greensboro, NC (sonnet)

James Larkin Pearson (free verse):
JUDGE: Felicia Mitchell, Emory, VA
1st “Address to Monarchs” by Ross White, Durham, NC
2nd “My Mother’s Lake” by Ann Campanella, Huntersville, NC
3rd “What Burns for Light” by Lisa Zerkle, Charlotte, NC
HM “Circumventing the Circumference” by Terry Collins, Mount Airy, NC
HM “ThingsFall Out of My Father” by Robert Moyer, Winston Salem, NC
HM “The Lesbians Next Door” by Alice Osborn, Raleigh, NC

Ellen Johnston-Hale (humorous verse):
JUDGE: Gloria Alden, Southington, OH
1st “Where Time Does Not Fly” by Susan Spalt, Carrboro, NC
2nd “The Voice” by Barbara Brooks, Hillsborough, NC
3rd “Arctic” by Lisa Zerkle, Charlotte, NC
HM “BlackFriday” by Doris Dix Caruso, Burlington, NC
HM “Patience” by Jane Shlensky, Bahama, NC
HM “I ThinkThey Got It!” by Janet Ireland Trail, Greensboro, NC

Charlotte Young (elementary school):
JUDGE: David Roderick, Greensboro,NC
1st “Jupiter” by Sydney Campanella (home-schooled), Huntersville, NC
2nd “Light Saves Us” by Paige Morrison (North Forest Pines Elem.), Wake Forest, NC
3rd “Blue” by Joellen Callahan (North Forest Pines Elem.), Wake Forest, NC
HM “Doves”by Sonja Woolley (Episcopal Day School), Southern Pines, NC
HM “NatureWalk” by Lilly Corcoran (Episcopal Day School), Southern Pines, NC

Carol Bessent Hayman (middle school):
JUDGE: David Roderick, Greensboro,NC
1st “The Pledge of Sausage” by Devon Stocks (Clarkton School of Discovery), Clarkton, NC
2nd “Pumpkin Patch” by Kenneth More [sp?] (Clarkton School of Discovery), Clarkton,NC

Sam Ragan North Carolina Connection (high school):
JUDGE: Natasha Trethewey, Decatur,GA
1st “Lesson of the Lark” by Maggie Apple of North Guilford HighSchool
2nd Jennifer Comerford of North Guilford High School

Congratulations to all the finalists, especially those NCWN members!

A New Year means the chance for a new, writerly you. What’s your writing resolution for 2012?

Do you want to write 1,000 words a day? Join a critique group? Finally begin submitting that story you’ve been working on for so long?

Join the conversation on our Facebook event page, and tell us what you plan to accomplish this year!

Courtesy of Jill Brazel

We received an e-mail from the organizers of the Split This Rock Festival, which will take place March 22-25 in Washington, DC, and we wanted to pass it along. This four-day poetry festival brings together poets, activists, and writers from around the country.

Featured guests include Alice Walker and other visionary and powerful voices of our time: environmental activists, youth organizers, Pulitzer-Prize winners, slam champions, poets of all ethnicities, DC-area poets, an opera librettist, translators, editors and publishers and emerging poets.

To learn more about the festival, click here. For a complete lineup of poets, click here.

Early-bird registration lasts until February 22, 2012. There are also students rates, day rates, and scholarships.

You can also volunteer, and sign up to receive e-mail updates.

We just heard a rumor that the December 2011 issue of WNC Women will feature an ebullient review of Echoes Across the Blue Ridge: Stories, Essays, and Poems by Writers Living in and Inspired by the Southern Appalachian Mountains (Winding Path Publishing, 2010). In a sneak peak, reviewer Mary Ickes said, “In all sincerity, I’ve never read a collection in which I liked every piece. Deciding which authors to include proved frustrating, because I wanted to mention everybody! GO NETWEST!”

From the book’s description:

Echoes Across the Blue Ridge consists of the work of 62 authors: members of North Carolina Writers’ Network West. The volume includes stories and poems reflecting the everyday lives of mountain people, their experiences, their outlook on life, and their overall philosophies. The subjects range from the mundane to hilarious comic sketches. The reader will laugh, cry, and feel the heart and soul of these writers.

Contributors include former North Carolina Poet Laureate Kathryn Stripling Byer of Cullowhee; Gary Carden of Sylva; and an introduction by Robert Morgan, among many more.

This collection was edited by Nancy Simpson and received blurbs from acclaimed NC authors Ron Rash and Lee Smith. It would make the perfect holiday gift for anyone who loves great writing or who is interested in North Carolina’s culture and history.

Echoes Across the Blue Ridge is available anywhere books are sold, through the NetWest website, and through www.ncwriters.org.

Congratulations to NetWest and all who contributed to this important piece of North Carolina heritage.