Martin Fellow in Letters

About the fellowship

Student Writing Contest

Honors and Awards: A five-hundred dollar ($500) honorarium will be awarded to the student whose work most powerfully and uniquely addresses the theme. In addition to the honorarium, the winning student will receive the title of Martin Fellow in Letters and will have her or his work published in Rolling Stonehill. Four other students, one from each class, will receive honorable mentions.

All students recognized in the contest will receive a bound copy of the works selected for honors. Bound copies will also be put on display in the Martin Institute and be distributed to the president of the college as well as the college archives. All students recognized in the contest will be honored at the college's honors ceremony with the Martin Fellow asked to give a public reading at "Meditations on Indigenous Studies," an event to be held in the Martin Institute on Wednesday, March 23.

Submissions: Submissions should be original, unpublished work produced for this contest. Entries should not exceed 4,500 words. No entrant may send more than one submission, and entries must be delivered to the Martin Institute, Room 233 by Friday, March 4 at 5:00.

Submissions must be typewritten, double-spaced, and accompanied by a cover sheet with the following information: title, word count, author's name, address, phone number, and e-mail address. Of this information, only the title should appear on the manuscript itself.

Selection of Winner: Winners will be chosen by a committee selected by members of the Martin Institute Faculty Steering Committee based upon presentation suitability, tightness, clarity, and structure.

Nonfiction entries will be further judged on logic; use of quotes, statistics and anecdotes, and order;

Fiction entries will be further judged on characterization, conflict, dialogue, plotting, beginning, ending, figures of speech.

Poetry will be further judged on the concept, cadence or rhythmic beat, sound echoes, any other device (such as figurative language) that appeals to the imagination or engages the reader's senses; and for traditional verse, and adherence to form.

Recent Fellows

The 2011 Martin Fellow in Letters is:

Joseph Masciangioli for his work