Become the next acclaimed Tupelo Press author!

We welcome your submissions and offer many opportunities each year to submit your work.

It is important that you read the complete guidelines for each contest or reading period before submitting your work. Writers submitting work for consideration may be published authors or writers without previous book publications. Submissions are accepted from anyone writing in the English language, whether living in the United States or abroad.

Tupelo Press does not publish children’s books, inspirational books, graphic novels, or religious books. We do not accept emailed manuscripts for any contest, reading period, or submission opportunity.

Before submitting an entry to Tupelo Press, please explore the work of the writers we have published. We’re drawn to technical virtuosity combined with abundant imagination; memorable, vivid imagery and strikingly musical approaches to language; willingness to take risks; and an ability to convey penetrating insights into human experience.

Read our submission procedures here.

Tupelo Prizes

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The Last Milkweed Anthology

Submissions closed

Send us poems on, about, over, under, or inspired by milkweed, autumn grasses, autumn leaves, or anything else autumnal in feel or in fact, for a photography / poetry anthology on, of course, the autumn season! Jeffrey Levine will supply the photos. You’ll supply the poems. Please include some element of hybridity in every poem. Interpret that as you will. Fresh work only, nothing previously published. 

Read the complete guidelines here.

$15 submission fee for up 3 poems. Not a contest. Please include your name and email on each page. Feel free to provide a short bio. Modest publication fees will be paid for each accepted poem. 

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Berkshire Prize

Submission period: January 1st – April 30th

The annual Tupelo Press Berkshire Prize Award for a First or Second Book of Poetry is an open competition for a poetry manuscript with a $3,000 prize. Prior winners include Kristina Jipson, Daniel Khalastchi, Megan Snyder-Camp.  Read the complete guidelines here.  See last year’s winner.

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Sunken Garden Chapbook Poetry Prize

Submission Period:  August 1st to October 31st

The Sunken Garden Poetry Prize is a prestigious national poetry prize established in 2002. The Prize has drawn submissions from around the country that have been judged by renowned poets such as Martha Collins, Patricia Smith and Tony Hoagland. The winner receives a cash prize, a book launch, and publication of a chapbook.  Read the complete guidelines.  See past winners.

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Dorset Prize

Submission period:  September 1st – January 31st

The annual Dorset Prize is an open competition for a poetry manuscript, with a $10,000 prize. Prior winners include G.C. Waldrep, Joshua Corey, Rusty Morrison, and Ilya Kaminsky. Read the complete guidelines here.  Click here to see past winners.

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Snowbound Chapbook Award

Submission period:  December 1st – February 28th

The annual Snowbound Chapbook Award is an open competition for a poetry manuscript with a prize of $1,000 and 25 copies. Prior winners include Kath Jesme, Brandon Som, and Stacey Waite. Read the complete guidelines here.  Click here to see all past winners.

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Tupelo Quarterly

Tupelo Quarterly, a literary journal, extends and expands upon the vision of Tupelo Press, publishing work by emerging and established writers and artists of many sensibilities and styles. Tupelo Quarterly cultivates generous artistic community, celebrates intellectual curiosity and creative risk, and presumes abundance. We hold the gate open, not closed. Read the complete guidelines here.

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Non-Fiction Submissions

Submission period:  year round

Our editors now read submissions of hybrid and creative non-fiction year-round. We are not currently reading fiction. Prose manuscripts are not read anonymously. Read the complete guidelines here.

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