Endowed in perpetuity by the Glenna Luschei Fund for Excellence

February 2020

Cast a New Light (or, why Kwame banned "gloaming": #fivewordfridays

Submitted by astrosnider on Thu, 02/27/2020 - 18:09
a series of vocabulary-based prompts

by Ashley Strosnider

 

Tackled the excercise below? Come up with something brilliant or hilarious? Tweet us a favorite line or phrase @theSchooner!

 

Last week, one of our new interns was reading submissions, and he stopped and said, “I just read two poetry submissions in a row with the phrase ‘a jealous moon.’ What are the odds?” Unfortunately, the odds are not so long.

A few years back, our Editor in Chief, Kwame Dawes, shared a tweet a day in a series he called “Memos to Poets,” and he called out a few words he was seeing too often.  

#13: This just in: “Gloaming” has been banned from poetry, especially Irish themed poems

So You Wanna Win A Book Prize?

Submitted by astrosnider on Wed, 02/26/2020 - 12:24
An Interview with Venita Blackburn
Author Venita Blackburn is pictured in profile, wearing black-framed glasses and a black hoodie, with her left hand on her forehead

by Jamaica Baldwin

For the next several weeks, visit the blog for illuminating conversations between PS Book Prize Coordinator Jamaica Baldwin and writers who have played the book prize game and won! We're currently seeking submissions for the Raz-Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize. Click here for full details. Read on for Baldwin's conversation with Venita Blackburn, who won the PS Book Prize for her story collection Black Jesus and Other Superheroes.

Welcome to #fivewordfridays

Submitted by astrosnider on Thu, 02/20/2020 - 17:46
a series of vocabulary-based prompts
white text that reads #fivewordfridays on a bright orange background

by Ashley Strosnider

Tackled the excercise below? Come up with something brilliant or hilarious? Tweet us a favorite line or phrase @theSchooner!

Good writing strives toward many things—often it’s momentum, stakes, and surprise. Ideally, when you’re writing carefully (or at the very least, when you’re revising!), you’re aware of the language of your work, instead of only the content of the idea or the narrative thrust, and you’re making careful, interesting, and economical selections to keep a poem or a story moving, and to keep a reader moving along with it. You brilliant writer, you, of course you choose your words wisely.

So You Wanna Win A Book Prize?

Submitted by pclark on Tue, 02/11/2020 - 17:17
An Interview with Luisa Muradyan

by Jamaica Baldwin

Exciting news! The PS Blog is back from hiatus. We're kicking things off with a revival of our fun and useful "So You Wanna Win A Book Prize?" interview series. For the next several weeks, visit the blog for illuminating conversations between PS Book Prize Coordinator Jamaica Baldwin and writers who have played the book prize game and won! Don't forget, we're currently seeking submissions for the Raz-Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize. Click here for full details. Read on for Baldwin's conversation with Luisa Muradyan, who won the PS Book Prize for her poetry collection American Radiance.