“Write every day.” That is the advice any award-winning author gives to aspiring writers. The continuous practice helps build essential storytelling skills as well as establishing a daily routine to fuel creativity.
Tulsa City-County Library’s annual Young People’s Creative Writing contest can help achieve a writing routine. The contest is geared much like a publisher works. You are given deadline, parameters and encouraged to submit your best story.
Entries are currently being accepted until June 5. The contest is free to enter and open to ages 10-18 for those who live in Tulsa County, attend school in Tulsa County or have a nonresident library card.
To help show young writers tips and tricks, local writing instructor Mike McKnight will lead the “Creative Writing Workshop” May 5, 4 p.m., at Schusterman-Benson Library, 3333 E. 32nd Place. The workshop is for ages 10-18 and will cover aspects of the creative writing process as well as methods to break through “writer’s block.”
There are three age divisions: 10-12, 13-15 and 16-18. Participants may enter one manuscript per category. Within each age division, there are five categories:
- Short Story – each entry no more than 1,500 words.
- Informal Essay – a short composition on a topic of issue giving your opinion or recounting a personal experience. Limited to 1,500 words.
- Poetry – one poem, no more than 300 words.
- Short Play – no more than six characters, no more than three locations, no more than 10 pages. Limited to five to 10 minutes in length.
- Comix – entry must be complete in and of itself, and not a fragment of a larger work. No more than eight pages. Work can be with or without words, in black and white or color, and fiction or nonfiction. Computer-generated images are acceptable as long as they are original works (no clip art). Use 8 ½” by 11” paper and submit as flat work, not as a booklet.
Within each age division and category, cash prizes are awarded in the following amounts: $100 for first place, $50 for second place and $25 for third place.
Tulsa City-County Library and the Tulsa Performing Arts Center Trust will present some of the award-winning short plays at the Hardesty Regional Library’s Connor’s Cove, 8316 E. 93rd St. The playwrights will be invited to attend rehearsals and will be honored at a reception following the performance.
KWGS Public Radio 89.5 will invite selected poetry and essay winners to record pieces of their work, and, at the discretion of the station, will broadcast some of the recordings.
All entrants will receive an invitation to the awards program, which will be held on Friday, Aug. 21, 7 p.m. at Hardesty Regional Library’s Connor’s Cove, 8316 E. 93rd St. Sharon Draper, winner of the 2015 Anne V. Zarrow Award for Young Readers’ Literature, will be the featured speaker and will present the awards.
The contest is sponsored by the Tulsa Library Trust, KWGS Public Radio 89.5, Tulsa Performing Arts Center Trust and Tulsa’s Channel 8. Additional support provided by The Mary K. Chapman Foundation and George Kaiser Family Foundation.
Entry forms with rules and regulations are available at all TCCL locations or on the library’s teen website, http://teens.tulsalibrary.org. For more information, call your local library or the AskUs Hotline, 918-549-7323.
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