The Prizes

1st Prize: £1,000 / US$1600*

The winner and nine runners-up will be published in the Lightship paperback anthology to be printed in September 2011 and will be invited to read from their work at an awards ceremony in October 2011. (Please note we cannot fund travel costs to and from the awards.)

The Judge

Jackie Kay will judge the Lightship International Poetry Prize 2010-2011. Jackie was born and brought up in Scotland. Her most recent collection of short stories, Wish I was Here, won the Decibel British Book Award. She has won the Guardian Fiction Prize for her novel Trumpet. Her most recent collection of poetry Darling, New and Selected Poems was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. She was awarded an MBE in 2006. The Lamplighter, her long poem to commemorate the abolition of the slave trade, was published by Bloodaxe. She lives in Manchester with her son. Her memoir, about finding her Nigerian father, Red Dust Road, was published by Picador in June 2010.

The Rules

1. Our Poetry competition opens on 14th August 2010 and closes at midnight (GMT) on 30th June 2011. Any poems submitted after the deadline will not be eligible for entry.
2. Poems should not exceed 200 words.
3. The poetry competition is open to writers of any nationality writing in English. There is no restriction on theme or style.
4. Entrants must be 16 years of age or over.
5. You can enter on-line, or by post. No entry form is required. If you enter by post please include your name and address on a separate sheet of paper along with the title of your entry.
6. You can enter as many times as you like. One poem per entry.
7. Please do not put your name on your poems. All judging is done anonymously. Poems with names on them will be disqualified.
8. Poems cannot be altered after entry.
9. The ten winning poems must be available for the anthology and, therefore, must not have been published previously in any form. If you enter your poem into another competition and you win, please notify us and withdraw your submission. Where work is withdrawn, entry fees will not be refunded.
10. Copyright returns to the author one year after publication. Entrants are deemed to grant us exclusive worldwide licence over each entry submitted for one year after publication, and for publicity purposes thereafter. Selected pieces may appear in electronic format on the Lightship website, or in other electronic forms.
11. Please note that notification of receipt of entry will come from your payment processor (Paypal) and that no correspondence will be entered into once you have submitted your work.
12. Entries will not be returned under any circumstances.
13. The judges' verdict is final. No correspondence or discussion will be entered into.
14. We reserve the right to disqualify any entry if we have reasonable grounds to believe that the entrant has breached any of these Rules.
15. We cannot accept any responsibility for any damage, loss, injury or disappointment suffered by any entrant entering the Competition.
16. We will act in accordance with current UK data protection legislation in relation to your personal data. All personal data entered on this site is secure.
17. The Lightship competitions and Rules will be governed by English Law and any dispute will be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England and Wales.
18. We reserve the right to amend these Rules where it is deemed necessary to do so or where circumstances are beyond our control. Any changes to the Rules will be posted on the Lightship website.
19. We reserve the right to not award the first prize, and to cancel the publication of the anthology, where circumstances are beyond our control, or if the judges’ overall verdict is that the level of entries is not up to the required standard for publication. In the unlikely event of the competition being cancelled, entry fees will be refunded.
20. Submission of entry is taken to be an unqualified acceptance of these Rules.

Enter On-line

• On-line entry costs £8.00
• A Critique (optional) costs £15.00

On-line entries will only be accepted if entered through our website. Please do not send your poems as email attachments.

Do not put your name on your poem, please. Your poem is will be automatically linked to your name when you enter through the website.

The cost of an on-line entry is fixed at £8.00 Sterling. Conversion to your local currency will be done automatically by your credit card company, according to the exchange rate at that time.

How to Enter by Post

Postal entry costs £10.00. A Poetry Critique sent by post (optional) costs £20.00. To enter by post, please include entry fee and poem in the same envelope. Make cheques payable to Lightship. Please note that cheques must be made out in the currency of the country from which they are sent, to the full value of the fee, or the entry will be deemed null and void. Receipt of entry will be sent by e mail only so please provide an email address. Poems will not be returned. Critiques will be returned by email.

Post to: Lightship Publishing Ltd, Meredith Building, 23-33 Reform Street, Hull HU2 8EF, United Kingdom.

*subject to exchange rate