Announcing the Inaugural Max Ritvo Poetry Prize
Milkweed Editions, in partnership with Riva Ariella Ritvo-Slifka and the Alan B. Slifka Foundation, is pleased to announce the inaugural Max Ritvo Poetry Prize.
Designed to honor the legacy of one of the most original and accomplished poets to emerge in recent years, and to reward outstanding emerging poets for years to come, the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize will be awarded annually to the author of a debut collection of poems. The winning poet will receive publication by Milkweed Editions in April 2018 and $10,000, making the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize the most lucrative first-book prize.
We aim to establish a transparent, ethical prize that brings together a community of poets to play a significant role—and to be compensated generously—in considering submissions. Celebrated poet Henri Cole will judge the inaugural prize. He has chosen five emerging poets to serve as paid first readers: Ruth Awad, Graham Barnhart, Lauren Cook, Allison Pitinii Davis, and Jordan Zandi.
“Max Ritvo came into the Milkweed family like a ball of fire last year, and publishing Four Reincarnations has been profoundly energizing for us all,” said Daniel Slager, Milkweed Editions Publisher and CEO. “I can think of no better way to honor Max and his legacy than a first-book poetry prize, which will honor outstanding accomplishment in the art form he excelled in, enriching American letters for years to come.”
Submissions will be open from July 1 through August 31, 2017, and the winner will be announced December 1, 2017.
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For more information and to review prize guidelines, please visit the Prize’s page on our website»
Max Ritvo
Max Ritvo (1990-2016) wrote Four Reincarnations in New York and Los Angeles over the course of a long battle with cancer. He was also the author of The Final Voicemails, edited and introduced by Louise Glück, and co-authored Letters from Max with Sarah Ruhl; both books were published posthumously. Ritvo’s poetry has appeared in the New Yorker and Poetry, among many other publications.
The poems of this debut collection are dispatches from chemotherapy beds and hospitals and the loneliest spaces in the home. They are relentlessly embodied, communicating pain, violence, and loss—and yet they are also erotically, electrically attuned to possibility and desire.