Competition Rules

  1. All paid up members of Leeds Writers Circle are eligible to enter every competition organised by the Circle.
  2. There is no entry fee.
  3. Each member is allowed only one entry for each competition with no editing allowed after submission.
  4. Entries may be resubmitted only if they previously failed to win an award.
  5. The Competition Co-ordinator will issue a Competition Announcement giving details of the scope and deadline submission date for each competition and the criteria agreed with the appointed judge.
  6. Entries submitted on paper should be typewritten, printed on only one side and delivered by hand or post to the Competitions Co-ordinator or a committee member. Submissions by email should be sent as an attachment rather than in the body of the email to: comp@leedswriterscircle.org. Acceptable formats are MS Word (.doc or .docx), PDF, or text (.rtf or .txt). Files in other formats may be disqualified. An acknowledgement email will be sent within three days of receipt of email entries. If you don’t receive an acknowledgement, it is your responsibility to contact the Competition Co-ordinator.
  7. Prose entries should state the number of words; poetry entries should state the number of lines.
  8. The manuscript must have a title but not show the name or any other means of identifying the author. The author’s name and the title of the submission should be provided either on the envelope containing the paper submission or in the email to which the submission is attached.
  9. Each entry will be allocated a number. The Competitions Co-ordinator will maintain a list of entry numbers, titles and authors for the purpose of identifying the authors of winning entries.
  10. Unless otherwise stated in the competition announcement there will be 1st, 2nd and 3rd prize certificates awarded. At the discretion of the judge, one or more entries may be awarded Highly Commended. The Annavation Award (named in honour of Anna Sutcliffe, a longstanding member of the Writers Circle who sadly died in 2021) is presented at the discretion of the judge to one entry which, while not necessarily being a first/second/third prizewinner, shows originality and/or innovation in writing style, content, presentation or any other facet deemed pertinent by the judge.