Thanks so much to everyone who participated in Iron Pen 2023. We received many terrific entries, and our excellent judges—Samantha DeFilippo (nonfiction), Rachel Rixen (fiction), and Deanie Vallone (poetry), who are last year’s winners in each category—had very difficult decisions to make in their evaluations. We appreciate everyone’s time and talents in making this year’s contest one of the biggest we’ve ever had (120 people registered for Iron Pen XV).
Thank you all very much for participating in the fastest writing contest in the Midwest! We appreciate your writing courage & quick imagination, and we look forward to seeing all of your terrific submissions.
Before we get to the prompt (which will also be available via phone on the MWC’s outgoing voice message at 309-732-7330, via the home page and the Iron Pen page on the MWC website, and on our Facebook page), a few guidelines and other important bits of information:
How to Start a Story: Writing Snapshots to Stories – Prose Workshop, led by Aida Zilelian
Thursday, March 2, 2023, 5:00 – 7:00 p.m. CST | Me
Snapshots are self-contained moments that tell a deeper story. In this class we will engage in various activities to write snapshot stories. We can use these stories to create a sequential montage or elaborate into a longer developed story.
The fastest writing contest in the Midwest is back and taking registrations now!
The Midwest Writing Center is taking registrations for its 15th annual Iron Pen Contest. MWC will supply a prompt to all contestants at 5 p.m. on Friday, February 24 and contestants have 24 hours (entries are due Saturday, February 25 by 5 p.m.) to write and submit their best fiction, non-fiction, and/or poetry pieces. Writers are welcome to enter into as many categories as they like with a paid registration for each entry.
The Foster-Stahl Chapbook Series, which looks to publish outstanding short collections of poetry, prose (fiction or nonfiction), or hybrid work from poets and writers living in the upper Midwest region (this includes the following states served by Arts Midwest: IL, IN, IA, MI, MN, ND, OH, SD, WI). Submissions for the third year of the series are open now.
MWC is accepting workshop proposals from the public for dates between Oct. 1, 2022 and May 31, 2023!
Anyone is welcome to send a proposal! Details in the slides!