The T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry is an annual award for the best unpublished book-length collection of poetry in English, in honor of native Missourian T. S. Eliot’s considerable intellectual and artistic legacy. The purpose of the T. S. Eliot Prize is to publish and promote contemporary English-language poetry, regardless of a poet’s nationality, reputation, stage in career, or publication history.

Prize: Truman State University Press offers $2,000 and publication of the winning collection under its standard royalty contract. All entrants will receive a copy of the winning book.

Manuscripts (not previously published) should be between 60-100 pages. A manuscript may contain individual poems previously published in journals or anthologies, but may not include a significant number of poems from a published chapbook or self-published book.

Fee: 25$ - checks payable to Truman State University Press.

Entries must be postmarked by October 31st 2009 to be considered.

Submission must include also a page with the manuscript’s name, a page with the author’s contact information, a page with the table of contents, also a list of acknowledgements for previously published individual poems. (also please include a SASE)

Results will be published in February.

Judges: Virgil Suarez, Grace Shulman, Alberto Rios, Naomi Shihab Nye, Ishmael Reed, Diane Wakoski, C. D. Wright, David Wagoner, Lynne McMahon, Dana Gioia, Mary Oliver, X. J. Kennedy, Samuel Maio.

Contact: Truman State University Press, 100 East Normal Avenue, Kirksville, MO 63501-4221, U. S. A.