2022 Helen Schaible International Sonnet Contest
Deadline midnight (CDT), July 15, 2022
Helen Schaible was a poet, mother, teacher, classicist. The Helen Schaible International Sonnet Contest was established in her memory in 1998 by
the Poets Club of Chicago and funded by a gift
from Helen's daughters Jane Edwards, Lucy Parker, and Katherine Martin, and her son, the late David Schaible.
The 2022 Helen Schaible International Sonnet Contest has closed.
Winners will be notified by late September, 2022. A list of all 18 winners’ names and poem titles will be posted on the Poets & Patrons website. All winners will be invited to participate in an online reading in October. Poets & Patrons would like to thank all who participated.
Contest Categories & Rules
Categories:
#1 Traditional Sonnet – Shakespearean or Petrarchan
#2 Modern Sonnet (See below for a definition and guidelines)
Open to All. Free. Enter only one poem in either Category #1 or #2, or one poem in each. The entries must be original and unpublished. Poets can only win or be noted in one category.
Contest Prizes
Prizes for both categories: First Prize: $50. Second Prize: $30. Third Prize: $20.
Three Honorable Mentions and three Special Merits per category, ranked.
Winners will be notified by late September, 2022. A list of all 18 winners’ names and poem titles will be posted on the Poets & Patrons website. All winners will be invited to participate in an online reading in October.
Rules
Electronic Entries Only.
To enter: Send one email to the following address, using the words “Sonnet Contest” and your last name in the subject line. In the body of your email, include your name, address, phone number, and where you heard about the contest. Then list the title(s) of your sonnet(s), noting
if each is traditional or modern. Finally, attach each sonnet separately to the email as a
Word doc, using “traditional” or “modern” as the name for each. On each poem attached, note the category in the upper right corner. DO NOT put your name or any other identification
on the poems.
Deadline midnight (CDT), July 15, 2022
Send entries by midnight CDT, July 15, 2021, to: kate28.hutchinson@gmail.com. Email Kate if you have any questions.
No late entries or paper (snail-mail) entries will be accepted.
A note about judging: All judging of poems is done anonymously, with no input from anyone associated with Chicagoland Poets & Patrons. All judges’ decisions are final.
2022 Traditional Sonnet Judge: Marilyn L. Taylor, Madison, WI
Marilyn L Taylor, former Poet Laureate of the state of Wisconsin and the city of Milwaukee, is the author of eight collections of poetry. Her work has appeared in Poetry, Able Muse, Measure, and The American Scholar, and has won awards in a number of poetry competitions, including the Margaret Reid Poetry Prize for Verse in Forms, the Margaret Faust Sonnet Contest, and the 2021 “Better Than Starbucks” sonnet competition. She is a contributing editor for two poetry journals (Verse-Virtual and Third Wednesday), and she also edited the recent anthology titled Love Affairs at the Villa Nelle (Kelsay Books, 2018). A former Milwaukeean, Taylor currently lives in Madison, where she continues to present readings and independent workshops locally, statewide, and elsewhere. Her new collection, Outside the Frame: New and Selected Poems (Kelsay Books, 2021) is available from the publisher (Kelsay Books), from Amazon, and from her website: www.mltpoet.com/books
2022 Modern Sonnet Judge: Steven Concert, Harveys Lake, PA
Steven Concert’s poetry has been widely recognized, and his manuscript entry was named a Finalist in NFSPS’ 2021 Stevens Manuscript Competition. His poem “Soaring with Icarus” was awarded 1st Place in the 2020 Writer’s Eye competition (York, PA). Recent publication credits include Common Threads, Art Through the Eyes of the Mad Poets, and Word Fountain. He has served as judge for several state and national organizations, including the League of Minnesota Poets, the Poetry Society of Michigan, Ohio Poetry Day, and the Poetry Society of Oklahoma. Steven is a board member of Pennsylvania Poetry Society and NFSPS. He is a member of the Ohio Poetry Association, League of Minnesota Poets, River Poets (Bloomsburg, PA), and Mad Poets Society (Media, PA). He serves PPS as Treasurer and is their current book editor. Steven’s three volumes of poetry are Too Blind To See, Standing in the Chaos, and No Mortar Required. His has a full-length collection forthcoming in this year.
Some Thoughts on Defining a Modern Sonnet:
Modern sonnets are poems that violate one or more of the rules of traditional sonnets, but still contain what the Poetry Foundation website refers to as a “ghost” of the sonnet form. They may or may not be rhymed, and they may experiment with various meters or not use a regular meter at all. Usually they are fourteen lines, but that is not always so. Rules about subject matter are also looser than in the more traditional sonnets. If you have questions, check the following web pages for examples:
www.poetryfoundation.org (search on “sonnet”)
www.litcharts.com (click on “Literary Terms,” then on “s” and “sonnet”)
http://www.aplithelp.com (search on teaching sonnets; or click on the picture when
it comes up and scroll down to the line to Annie Finch’s article, “Chaos in Fourteen Lines.”
If you google “sonnet variations – writing.com,” you can find a long list of different
kinds of sonnets. http://swandance.blog.sohu.com/159263134.html (This web page provides
a long list of sonnet variations.)