Literarily Speaking

The Writer's Club at Montgomery County Community College is asking student and community writers to put pen to paper for its annual fiction and poetry contest. 

The college's writers’ club and professor Patricia Nestler put MCCC on the map — literarily — with the annual Writers’ Conference, featuring keynote addresses with luminaries of the literary world. Past speakers have included Michael Chabon, Joyce Carol Oates, and the late John Cheever.

And for the 24th year, the club will shine a spotlight on student and community writers, with its annual Fiction and Poetry Contest, which is to open to both students and community members.

“Roughly half to one-third of the entries are from students, and half to two-thirds are from community members,” Nestler said via e-mail. Nonstudent writers tend to be years away from their student days, she said. “Except for the years when area high school English teachers submit entries from their entire writing classes, usually the nonstudent contestants tend to be mature writers.”

The club will accept submissions of poetry and fiction until 2 p.m. on March 9.  Prizes range from $100 for first place to $25 for fourth place in each category.

Nestler said, in general, she is very pleased with the quality of submissions every year.

“In fact, our club newsletter routinely publishes some of the student winners,” she said.

Entries should be submitted to Professor Patricia Nestler, Parkhouse Hall, Room 451, Montgomery County Community College, 340 DeKalb Pike, Blue Bell, PA 19422. E-mailed entries will not be accepted.

Submissions should be printed on 8.5x11-inch paper and should be double-spaced. Prose should be a maximum of 3,000 words.

Your name, address, e-mail address and phone number should be printed on a separate title page, along with the category letter (A1 student poetry; A2 student fiction; B1 nonstudent poetry; B2 nonstudent fiction). The title of the work should be printed in the upper right-hand corner of each page after the title page, along with the last four digits of the phone number from the title page.

The contestant’s name should not appear on any page except for the title page, and all pages should be numbered and clipped together. Contestants may submit one entry per category.

The submissions will be judged by the creative writing class alumni, who have become editors or who have been published since they left Nestler’s class.

Winners will be notified by mail, and entries will not be returned. For more information on the contest, call 215-641-6369.