Poems to Talk About 2015: For Peter Hartey
The Poetic Republic Competitions are unique. The competitions were designed with the belief that great creative works can be discerned through a process of democratic selection in which all participants play an integral part. This process, in which international participants perform the role of ‘author, reader, judge and editor in equal measure’, affords a breadth of insights into what we appreciate in creative works that cannot be generated by small editorial groups.
Sadly, the creator, of the competition, Peter Hartey, passed away before having announced the winners to the 2015 competitions. As friends of Peter, we had been following the progress of his competitions since their inception and felt it was important to complete the 2015 competitions.
We are pleased to announce the publication of two anthologies resulting from the 2015 Poetic Republic Short Story and Poetry competitions: “The Woodcarver: and Other Stories” and “Poems to Talk About”. These anthologies include the winning, shortlisted and other top-listed poems and stories from the competitions, as well as a selection of the participant-reviewer comments.
The 2015 ebooks are now available.
Short Story Anthology
The Woodcarver and Other Stories
Available To Buy On Amazon Now !
Poetry Anthology
Poems to Talk About
Writing Competitions Reinvented
As participants in the Poetic Republic poem and short story competitions many coming to the Poetic Republic site will be acquainted with the inspirational work of Peter Hartey, the founder and director of the Poetic Republic, and know that he passed away in June, 2015. In Peter’s memory, his friends and family are now endeavouring to complete the 2015 poetry and short story competitions. Over the next two months we will be working through the site with this in mind, hence its ‘re-opening’.
We know from conversations with Peter that he was looking forward to pulling together the e-book with the winning poems and short stories for 2015. He had planned a ‘working holiday’ in Avignon, France, fittingly, at the summer performance arts’ festival there. We intend to carry his work forward and publish the two e-books for both 2015 competitions.
We will be contacting participants about the book in the near future to establish permissions to do this from writers.
Peter loved the written and spoken word. He believed deeply that through the processes of sharing our love of poetry, stories and novels and through critical reflections of each other’s work, we can forge a vibrant, living and ongoing understanding of what moves people, of what inspires people, of what makes great writing. He created a way for this process to be open to us all and offered a space for writers to develop and thrive in the company of fellow writers and artists. His vision and intuition for democratic competitions have been vindicated in the wonderful writing, reflective comments and interactions on Poetic Republic with which we now have the pleasure to engage with
We had the great pleasure of listening to Peter talking about the 2015 competition and previous competitions, about the vision behind them and of the pleasure Peter gained from engaging with all the entries.We thank all participants of the competitions for helping Peter forge the Poetic Republic.
