CASELBERG TRUST INTERNATIONAL POETRY PRIZE 2022 – WINNERS ANNOUNCED
Posted: Monday Oct 17, 2022
The winners of the 2022 Caselberg Trust International Poetry Prize have been announced. The competition is now in its twelfth year, and this year attracted 131 poems from across New Zealand, Australia and the UK. This year’s competition was judged by Horowhenua based poet Glenn Colquhoun.
First place goes to Yvette Thomas from Tāmaki Makaurau – Auckland for her poem “Not what you wanted”, and “Self-portrait – nude” by Tāmaki Makaurau – Auckland based Margaret Moores was placed runner up. The winner receives $500 and a week’s stay at the Caselberg House. The second placed poet receives $250. Both poems and the judges report will be published in November in Landfall 244 – Spring 2022.
The three Highly Commended entries were “A home just for us” by Rata Gordon (Whāingaroa – Raglan), ‘Chicken” by Clare Orchard (Te Whanganui-a-Tara – Wellington), and “Too much telling” by Paula Clare King (Whārite - Ashhurst). Their poems, along with the two winning entries and the judges report, will be published on the Caselberg Trust website in late November.
In his judges’ report Glenn Colquhoun noted that “This has been the most difficult poetry competition I’ve ever had to judge. I was a pin cushion by the time I went through all of the poems. And the long list stretched out behind me for miles. I had to cast my eye back over it again and again to whittle it down.”
Colquhoun said of Yvette Thomas’s winning poem Not what you wanted, “It sang. And it hurt. And it made me recognise the hurt in all of us. And because it riddled with language. It juxtaposed words in combinations that made me think and feel the freshness of rejection all over again — no matter how old a friend it has been. And because it rose up and fought back and was beautiful. It spoke with a single uninterrupted voice.”
Yvette Thomas is currently attending Auckland University as part of the Masters of Creative Writing programme 2022 and has previously worked in film and television and written a short story, “The Lost One” which was published in Takahe (NZ) and in Pendulum (Australia). She subsequently adapted this story into a short film which she also directed. “The Lost One” was selected for the New Zealand International Film Festival (2007) and has been shown in numerous other international film festivals.
Margaret Moores has had a long engagement with the New Zealand bookselling community as both a bookstore owner and as a publisher’s sales representative. She holds a PhD in English (2021) and a Masters in Creative Writing with Distinction (2017) from Massey University. Her poetry and flash fiction have been published online and in journals and anthologies in Australia and New Zealand
The awards night will be held in November – details to be confirmed .