Jack Clemo Poetry Competition

The Jack Clemo Poetry competition will not run in 2012.

Its next appearance in ACG schedules will be in 2013. This year ACG is running a new Drama Award.

The primary aim of the poetry competition is to encourage poetry per se. We wish to see Christians writing better and better poetry and that poetry should not exist in some kind of ghetto land, but it should be out there in the forefront of artistic forms roaring away and making its presence felt.

This is the sculpture, made from Cornish stone, and is held by the winner of the competition for a year.

In addition to holding the sculpture for one year, the winner receives a cheque for £100.

There is a monetary reward of £75 for the second and £50 for the third. The winning entries are published on this website and can be seen here.

The Judges

The competition was administered by Tony Jasper. The judges in the past have included some well known writers and editors, as well as several with publishing contacts. They have included Stewart Henderson, one of the UK’s leading poets and known especially for his long running BBC Radio 4 series of ’Questions. Questions.’ and Adrian Plass, best selling author. Judges for this year were Bishop Bill Ind, Christine Smith, Director of Canterbury Press, Isabel Hariades, formerly of Phaidon Press, Kenneth Pickering, and Simon Baynes, Association of Christian Writers.

The Award Occasion

The awards were presented by Lady Mary Holborow DCVO, JP, Lord-Lieutenant of Cornwall and was held on 27 October 2011, 12.30 pm to 2.30pm at the Society of Authors, 84 Drayton Gardens, London SW10.

Poems should not have been previously published.

Copyright of the poems will remain with the writer but ACG reserves publication rights of the prize-winning entries.