Our Blog

Milkweed Editions and Copper Nickel are thrilled to announce that judge francine j. harris has chosen Kathryn Smith’s book Self-Portrait with Cephalopod as the winner of the 2019–20 Jake Adam York Prize.

Self-Portrait with Cephalopod will be published by Milkweed Editions in February 2021, and Smith will receive $2,000.

Kathryn Smith is the author of the full-length collection Book of Exodus (Scablands Books, 2017) and the chapbook Chosen Companions of the Goblin, winner of the 2018 Open Country Press Chapbook Contest. Her poems have appeared in Bellingham Review, The Journal, Mid-American Review, Poetry Northwest,…

For her manuscript The Clearing, chosen by acclaimed poet and judge Henri Cole, Adair will receive $10,000 and publication by Milkweed Editions in June 2020.

Khaled Mattawa, judge of the Ballard Spahr Prize for Poetry, has selected Patrick Johnson to be recipient of the 2019 prize for his manuscript Gatekeeper.

Upon accepting the National Book Critics Circle Award, Ada Limón delivered a powerful speech about women and community. Read the full speech here.

We are pleased to announce that judge Mark Doty has selected Brooke Matson’s collection In Accelerated Silence as winner of the next Jake Adam York Prize, presented in partnership by Copper Nickel and Milkweed Editions. Matson will receive $2,000 and her collection will be published by Milkweed in February 2020.

Milkweed Editions is pleased to announce that the Lindquist & Vennum Prize for Poetry, the largest regional poetry prize in the country, will continue under a new name, the Ballard Spahr Prize for Poetry. The prize will also offer expanded eligibility, adding Michigan to the list of eligible states of residence for entrants in the upper Midwest. The 2019 judge will be acclaimed poet, essayist, and literary translator, Khaled Mattawa.

For his manuscript The Milk Hours, chosen by acclaimed poet and judge Henri Cole, James will receive $10,000 and publication by Milkweed Editions in June 2019.

Rick Barot, judge of the seventh annual Lindquist & Vennum Prize for Poetry, has selected Twin Cities resident Claire Wahmanholm to be recipient of the 2018 prize, for her manuscript, Wilder. Wahmanholm will receive $10,000 as well as publication by Milkweed Editions in November 2018.

We are pleased to announce that judge Victoria Chang has selected John McCarthy’s collection Scared Violent Like Horses as winner of the 2017-18 Jake Adam York Prize for a first or second collection of poems, presented in partnership by Copper Nickel and Milkweed Editions. McCarthy will receive $2,000 and his collection will be published by Milkweed in February 2019.

Milkweed Editions, in partnership with Riva Ariella Ritvo-Slifka and the Alan B. Slifka Foundation, is pleased to announce that Grady Chambers is the winner of the inaugural Max Ritvo Poetry Prize. For his manuscript, North American Stadiums, chosen by acclaimed poet and judge Henri Cole, Chambers will receive $10,000 and publication by Milkweed Editions in June 2018.