The 2024 results will be found HERE
'erbacce' rhymes with 'apache' (er-ba-chee) and is Italian for 'weed'
{weeds grow where they want to; not where they are told to
...sometimes they even take over the garden}
Entry, every year, is TOTALLY FREE to everyone. World-Wide.
EVERY SUBMISSION WILL BE JUDGED 'BLIND'. WHY NOT START GETTING TOGETHER A SUBMISSION FOR NEXT YEAR?
The Prizes
ALL long-listed poets will be named on the erbacce
website as soon as we begin our final deliberations, usually at the beginning of, or towards the middle of, May; we will
NOT
notify these long-listed poets by email, so keep our site bookmarked. And NOTE; we publish 'poetry which is radical in form and/or content'
and if you'd like to see what that entails you can get a
FREE copy
as download of the erbacce-poetry journal bottom left of our 'erbacce Journal' page... if you are serious about winning then reading a previous copy is a MUST.
The outright
winner will be given a publishing contract
with
erbacce-press who will publish a perfect-bound collection of the winner's book
labelled 'Winner of the
erbacce-prize for poetry 2024'. Obviously if you enter then you must have sufficient poetry to fill about 90+ pages. We will also create a personalised web-page
for every winning poet whose perfect-bound collection we publish. We will pay all costs including the legal registering of the book, purchasing an ISBN, registering with Nielsen and supplying copies to the major libraries and of course to the author. The book will be sold through our sales/shop pages and the poet will be paid 20% royalties (which is twice as much as Random House, Bloodaxe, Faber & Faber or Penguin)
One or two runners-up will also be considered
and they will win either a perfect bound book or a high quality chap-book under similar terms to the winner.
Four other poets will be chosen to be the 'Featured Poet'
in each of the quarterly copies of our in-house journal 'erbacce' (NOTE: as from December 2021 the
erbacce
poetry journal is upgrading and will be published twice a year in a beautiful new perfect-bound, 96 page, glossy book; you can download a free copy HERE
or follow the link in the above menu-bar under 'erbacce-journal') If you are selected as 'Featured Poet' it means that a large section of the journal will be devoted to interviewing you as 'Featured Poet' and displaying/ publishing/ highlighting/ publicising your work OR (you choose) we will feature your work and invite you to write either an extended 'about me' or the freedom to sound-off about anything related to poetry/art/creative-lit in an extended essay. (Be as controversial as you like!)
IMPORTANT NOTIFICATION;
As from Autumn 2025 we will no longer send out hard copies of our journal to countries outside of the UK and some parts of the EU. This is due to spiralling postal charges and import duties being imposed by Customs. Instead we shall be sending (free) PDF versions to poets included in each edition unless they ask fora hard-copy and are prepared to pay any customs levies imposed by their country; within the UK hard-copies will continue to be sent.
SIMPLE SUBMISSION RULES:
Before you proceed it might be a good idea to download a free copy of our poetry-journal to see the kind of poetry we have published in the past... you can do this by visiting the 'erbacce-journal' link in the menu bar.
IMPORTANT NOTE: ALL submissions to the erbacce-prize may be used in future erbacce poetry journals both in paperback and/or electronically, (previously published or not) and
by sending a submission you agree to that
(we will of course send every poet we publish a copy of the Journal; gratis, though for those outside the UK, due to astronomical postage charges, we will send a downloadable copy as a PDF)...
1) Send us FIVE pages of poetry, (the email is
'editor (at) erbacce-press.co.uk') SINGLE spaced, in a single A4 MS Word document
as Rich Text Format
and with type set at
12 points in TNR
using black-and-white text only. (That is FIVE PAGES; not five poems)
Name this document with your full name
please but do NOT put your name or any other details about yourself inside
this document. NOTE; if files are sent as word attachments from a Mac they can corrupt if downloaded to a PC... and vice-versa; so
you MUST send us files in Rich Text Format (RTF) please.
2) You are welcome to send previously published
(please indicate under the title of the poem
(NOT at the end) in the format; 'Previously published in name-of-journal-in-italics date of publication' For example: 'Previously published in erbacce-journal nos72
May 2019') BUT we must see some unpublished work also.
3) In the body of the email we need your
full legal name and full snail-mail (postal) address; NOTHING else. If you don't supply a snail mail address we will not accept the submission; this is ESSENTIAL. (Snail mail address is your residence, your home address AND if it is USA please say so
otherwise it will be rejected). You can choose ANY name you like if we publish you but we MUST have your proper legal name with the submission for legal purposes.
4) In the 'subject' line of the email write
'erbacce-prize 2025'.
5) PLEASE do not include poetry set in 'frames' or in 'text-boxes' or the submission will be rejected.
6) ONE submission per poet only and DO ensure that
your email address as displayed
matches exactly the name of the poet who is making the submission
(See below under; 'A word to the wise'). You can choose ANY name you like if we publish you but we MUST have your proper name with the submission for legal purposes.
And THAT IS IT. SIMPLES. BUT; if you add anything else; an index, a commentary 'about you', or if you put your name and address in the MS Word document, then your submission will be rejected. You see we judge every entry 'blind'
and want nothing in the MS Word submission that can identify the author. However you MUST include a full name and snail-mail address in the email itself.
Please send submissions to erbacce-press by clicking HERE
to email us or email your submission to: 'editor (at) erbacce-press.co.uk' (Sorry we don't accept postal submissions) You will receive a brief acknowledgement from us, if you don't, you have not followed submission guidelines.
A word to the wise: PLEASE
read this...
We get a huge volume of entries because people know we are a free and high-quality poet-centred publishing co-operative and if you happen to win then we'll be looking for your email address in our email-address book; we hope it will be recognisable. BUT it has happened in the past that someone has won a prize but their name is not found in our address book. Why? Because while we are looking for Tom Smith the name doesn't exist because the individual has used an email address which wittily displays not 'Tom Smith' but 'Pluto Seminides'... witty indeed; but if we can't find the poet's REAL name then we'll dump the submission.
PLEASE use an email address that displays your correct name.
It would be tragic and a waste of your time were you to win and we couldn't find your email address to notify you. LAST YEAR WE DITCHED TWO POSSIBLE WINNERS BECAUSE WE COULD NOT FIND THE EMAIL THAT MATCHED THE NAME THE POET SUBMITTED UNDER.
BOTH THE NAME DISPLAYED ON THE EMAIL AND THE POET'S NAME ON THE SUBMISSION MUST BE THE SAME. COMMON SENSE IF YOU THINK ABOUT IT BUT SADLY SOME PEOPLE DON'T.
That's all there is to it, there is no catch, entry really is free and the prizes really are substantial; if you need to check out the quality of the books we produce then buy one at our 'Shop' using the button top-right of this page or subscribe to the journal... or read the wonderfully appreciative words from previous poets we have published
HERE... Previous winners have gone on to be invited to read in the USA, the UK, Eire, Italy, Venice, Germany etc.
The 'erbacce-prize for poetry' is recognised world-wide as an important and prestigious addition to any poets CV and a stepping stone to world-wide recognition.
Finally: GOOD LUCK to all of you. This could be a step up the publishing ladder and it is 100% FREE. You may use the link button below for submissions or email 'editor (at) erbacce-press.co.uk'