Questions about the Guyana Prize for Literature

Feb 07, 2017 Letters

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Dear Editor,

The Guyana Prize for Literature 2016 Awards Brochure that was published in the Guyana Chronicle January 8th 2017 has many flaws that need correction and clarification. I based my questions on the brochure on the following areas:
Under the Caption: CATEGORIES it reads as follows:
a) “Poetry – a collection of poems or one long poem by a single author.”
It did not say how many poems must be in this collection; a collection can be 5, 10, 15 or 20 poems etc. It should have stated a collection of poems of 30 to 200 poems or what amount they are looking for. It did not say if a collection of selected poems of like 300 poems by a single author will be accepted. It also mentioned ‘’or one long poem’’ now what is meant by a long poem? How long must this poem be 50 pages or more? A long poem can also be like several cantos of about 300 lines.
I believe more clarity should be in this brochure. In my opinion a collection of poems can be any amount even ten poems and a long poem can also be 60 lines this old archaic Guyana Prize Brochure needs to be revised and updated. For publishers and writers who are submitting manuscripts.
b) “Fiction- a novel or collection of short stories by a single author.”
Here again it did not say clearly how long the novel should be if it’s 30,000 to 100,000 words etc and for the short stories. It did not say how many stories should be in this collection and how long one story must be. More needs to be elaborated on here.
c) “Drama- a full length play.”
What is meant by a full length play; how many Acts make up a full length play or how many pages long can it start? From 60 to 120 pages long? Many writers are at a loss here pertaining to the amount of work to collate for submission here.
Let me quote; “In the case of categories (a), (b), (c) and (d) only works submitted by publishers will be accepted. However, for authors resident in Guyana only, unpublished manuscripts may be submitted by the author, provided that such scripts have been clearly typed by the author, on one side of the paper.” Here again, for writers submitting manuscripts it did not specify about the length of manuscripts in terms of pages. It goes on; “However, for authors resident in Guyana only, unpublished manuscripts may be submitted by the author, provided that such scripts have been clearly typed.” This sentence using the words ‘’may be’’ is not very good English. That is saying to writers that they are not certain if they can enter this award. This sentence should have read like this.
’’Authors who are resident (or living in Guyana) are asked to submit manuscripts in any of the categories above, provided that such scripts are
clearly typed on one side of the paper and is properly spiral bound.’’
d) “Publishers, (or authors in the case of drama or manuscript) are requested to submit (6) copies gratis of each title submitted.” This rule here is asking publishers and authors ‘in case of drama or manuscripts) to submit 6 copies of each title free of charge (gratis). Many writers and publishers can misinterpret this and think this is only for the drama category or resident-writers and excludes those submitting in categories a and b. This rule should have read like this:
’’Publishers and resident writers are asked to submit 6 copies of their books or manuscripts in every category submitted.’’
e) “CLARIFICATION ON MANUSCRIPTS: Revised unpublished manuscripts and manuscripts previously submitted and are now published will be accepted.”
I totally disagree with this ‘’clarification on manuscripts’’ because many authors won this award already with unpublished manuscripts, for example, Ruel Johnson won this award twice with unpublished manuscripts and other writers NOW, this rule here in gives a former winning entrant the right to now publish their manuscript that won this award before, to re-submit the same old past winning manuscript now published and they can win again and cannot be disqualified. This is really flawed.
This should have read: ‘’all previous manuscripts submission are ineligible to enter for this award.’’ This award is open for works published between January 1, 2015 and December 31, 2016 for published and unpublished manuscripts that are equally judged the same; so this rule should apply to resident writers and publishers submitting both published books and unpublished manuscripts within the same time frame. To accept a previous manuscript that won this award before that is now published will be unfair and a fraud to other writers both published and unpublished. Can someone elaborate on this flawed ‘’Clarification for me in rule (e)?
The Dead line is March 31st 2017, this year the deadline date should be extended to June 31st to facilitate resident writers to prepare their manuscripts for submission. Manuscripts should be judged in a separate category. I also believe that short listed writers should be given at least a $1000 US dollars and a Certificate of Merit like many other International Awards like the Booker Prize and the T.S.Eliot Poetry Prize among others. It is my sincere hope that these queries I raised here will be addressed and past judges of this award will not become entrants this year and the awards will not be awarded to a society of incestuous friends.
Rev.Gideon Cecil

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