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Stop Submitting to the Rattle Poetry Prize
Most poetry contests are scams
I’ve submitted to a lot of poetry contests over the years. There are many to choose from. It’s hard to resist the temptation to enter these contests, when they offer such lucrative rewards, many of them paying out at least a thousand bucks to the winners. Imagine it, getting paid a thousand bucks (at least!) just for writing a good poem.
Because of the prize money, many of these contests receive thousands of entries. Assuming you are truly sending in good poetry, and let’s assume most of the poets competing here know what they are doing, you have to figure that the odds are slim that you will be chosen as the “best” in such a pool of literary work. But, allowing that these poems are being judged for merit by a few editors or a guest judge, and allowing that the merit of poetry is as subjective as any art, it could be seen as buying a lottery ticket, if all things are equally measured.
It’s this point where I began to take umbrage with how poetry contests are executed. There’s a lot riding on the perception of fairness in these contests. Are they truly being judged fairly? Is your work really getting as much of a shot at winning as the other poets entering the contest? I have to say, probably not.
For an example of what I’m talking about here, let’s look closer at the Rattle Poetry Prize. This poetry contest has been going for fifteen years now, and is one of the most lucrative cash prizes poets can compete to win. The jackpot for one poem has steadily climbed in recent years and is currently up to $15,000. That’s FIFTEEN THOUSAND smackers. For ONE POEM. Honestly, it’s kind of ridiculous when you think about it, but there it is. The contest model is one of the only things keeping the public interested in poetry at all.
Oh, and let’s not forget that they also now have an additional $5,000 prize offered to one of the finalists, that their readers vote to decide. So, all told, Rattle gives $20,000 in prize money for their “poetry prize.” This is also in addition to their Rattle Chapbook prize, which is run separately and bestows another sum of $5,000 to each winner. Rattle seems to be giving away a lot of money here! How can they afford to do that?! I’ll answer that in a bit.
