Writing Opportunities for All

If you are looking for information about writing competitions and other publishing opportunities, then you’ve come to the right place!

This page will be regularly updated as the details of more opportunities come to hand, so check back here every so often.

Always be sure to head to the competition or journal’s own submission page and read all of the submission guidelines before submitting your work. Where possible, you are strongly encouraged to read previous issues to gauge the sort of work they accept and ensure your work is suited to that publication or publisher.

1. FAW Tasmania 2026 Nairda Lyne Award

The brief: submit an original, unpublished short story suitable for children aged 8 to 12 years, up to 1,000 words.

Entry fee: $5 per story.

Prizes: First Prize $100 and winner’s name inscribed on a plaque in the State Library Launceston Branch. Hobart Bookshop voucher for the best Tasmanian entry.

Closing date: Tuesday 31 March 2026.

More information: visit FAW Tasmania’s website and scroll down to the relevant competition.

2. Calanthe Collective Prize for Unpublished Poetry

The brief: submit up to three poems up to 50 lines.

Open to: Australian poets.

Categories: under 18 and open categories.

Entry fee: free for under 18 category; $10 for open category.

Prizes: In the under 18 category, the winner will be awarded $400. 2 x highly commended entries will receive $100 each. In the open category, the winner will be awarded $1000 and 2 x highly commended entries will receive $250 each.

Closing date: Tuesday 31 March 2026.

More info: visit the Calanthe Press website.

3. Little Black Dress Spooky Story Competition

The brief: write a story on the theme of “glitch” also contains significant elements of eeriness/spookiness and a clear connection to the theme.

Open to: Australian writers aged 8 to 17 years (as well as a category for adults).

Categories and word counts: Youth, 12 and under — 500 word count; Teen, 13-17 years — 1000 word count.

Entry fee: free for youth categories.

Prizes: see competition webpage for details.

Closing date: Monday 6 April 2026.

More info: visit the KSP Writers’ Centre website.

The brief: submit original submissions of fiction and creative non-fiction from 3,500 to 5,000 words. For the sake of this competition, emerging is defined as as writers ranging from previously unpublished through to those with a maximum of one published book in any of the following genres: novel, short story collection, essay collection, memoir, other work of non-fiction.

Entry fees: $25 (including GST) or $15 (including GST) for Griffith Review subscribers.

Prizes: Up to four winning entries share a prize pool of $20,000 and have their work published in an edition of Griffith Review.

Closing date: Monday 13 April 2026.

More information: visit Griffith Review‘s website.

5. The Southerly Poetry Prize

The brief: submit a poem or sequence of poems totalling no more than 100 lines.

Entry fees: $20 ($10 for Southerly subscribers).

Prizes: the winner will receive a cash prize of $2000 AUD, with their winning entry published in Southerly 81.1 in October 2026. Along with all shortlisted entries, the winner will also be published in Southerly online.

Closing date: Wednesday 15 April 2026.

More information: visit Southerly‘s website. 

6. Grieve 2026

The brief: submit prose, photography, visual art, film, audio, graphic storytelling and visual imagery, according to the following guidelines:

  • Prose: up to 500 words
  • Poetry: up to 38 lines
  • Image/Artwork: submit as a single file .pdf, .png, .jpeg, .jpg, .tiff, .tif files. An entry comprised of a series of images or artwork will be judged as a single coherent entry
  • Video: Up to 5 minutes of example video submitted as .mp4 or .mov 
  • Audio: Up to 5 mins of example audio submitted as .mp3

Entry fees: $22 ($20 + GST) for members of the Hunters Writers Centre; $25.85 ($23.50 + GST) for non-members.

Prizes: selected works that speak to the layered and complex nature of grief will be published in an anthology.

Closing date: Sunday 26 April 2026.

More information: visit the Hunter Writers Centre website.

7. Peter Cowan 600 Short Story Competition

The brief: write a short story with a maximum of 600 words. Stories may be of any theme, narrative structure, or genre but they MUST be 600 words or less.

Open to: Australian writers.

Categories: open, novice, seniors and youth.

Entry fee: $7 for youth category, $12 for other categories.

Prizes: see the competition’s web page for details.

Closing date: Thursday 30 April 2026.

More info: visit the Peter Cowan Writers Centre website.

8. Laura Literary Awards

The brief: write a short story or poem. For word limits, please refer to the competition’s web page.

Open to: Australian writers

Entry fees: free for under 18 category; $10 for entries in the open section.

Prizes: visit the competition’s web page for details of categories and prizes.

Closing date: Friday 8 May 2026. Please note that entries must be posted in, so allow plenty of time for your entry to be delivered.

More info: Rocky River ’Riters Blog.

9. Rabbit Annual of nonfiction poetry (2026)

The brief: submit one to three poems that explore, interrogate and push the boundaries of nonfiction writing, and are interested in reading poetic engagements with auto/biography, documentary, history, politics, economics, mathematics, cultural analysis, science, the environment, and all other aspects of real-world experience, recollection and interpretation.

Entry fees: free to submit.

Prizes: selected poems will be published in the Rabbit Annual of nonfiction poetry (2026)

Closing date: Saturday 30 May 2026.

More information: visit Rabbit‘s website.

10. RD Walshe National Writing for the Environment Prize: Spoken Words Matter

The brief: submit a script for a short play up to 1000 words.

Open to: Australian writers who are under 19, 19 to 25 years and over 65.

Entry fee: appears to be free to enter.

Prizes: visit the competition’s web page for details.

Closing date: Sunday 31 May 2026.

More info: visit the Sutherland Shire Environment Centre’s website.

Over to You

Which writing opportunity will you take up?