Creative Writing Competition

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In 2026, the American Association of Australasian Literary Studies (AAALS), together with the American Australian Association, welcomed submissions to the sixth annual Creative Writing Competition from March 1 through March 31, 2026. The Creative Writing Competition includes the following four prizes: AAALS Poetry Prize, AAALS Creative Prose Prize, AAALS Indigenous Writers Poetry Prize, and AAALS Indigenous Writers Creative Prose Prize. The winners are awarded US$1,000 cash prizes and publication in Antipodes.

Full details of the 2026 Creative Writing Competition, including all four prizes, can be found here. Additional details about the AAALS Indigenous Writers Prizes are available here.

Winners of the AAALS Indigenous Writers Creative Prose Prize:
2026: “Country Keeps You” by Kyrah Honner, Birri Gubba and Luritja

2025: “Pound of Flesh” by Allanah Hunt, Barkindji and Malyangapa

2024: “Being Country’s Soft Butch” by Ellen van Neerven, Mununjali Yugambeh

2023: “The Perfume Pagoda: Travels with My Mother” by Victoria G. Williams, Warraimaay

Winners of the AAALS Indigenous Writers Poetry Prize:
2026: “Rua tekau tau” by Vaughan Rapatahana, Te Ātiaw

2025: “Ceremony (for the Expatriated)” by Hinemoana Baker, Māori

2023: “Hinting at Decolonization” by Nicola Andrews, Ngāti Paoa

Winners of the AAALS Creative Prose Prize:
2026: “Persuasion” by Sue Swinburne

2025: “Parts” by Bonny Cassidy

2024: “Hebe’s Lament” by Gay L. Lynch

2023: “Slippery Jacks” by Jane N. Downing

2022: “Siren” by Catherine Padmore

2021: “The Hero of My Bones” by Susan M. Hancock

Winners of the AAALS Poetry Prize:
2026: “The Skellig Island Conversions” by Damen O’Brien

2025: “Staghound” by Stephanie Powell

2024: “X-ray” by Anne M. Casey

2023: “Mnemonics for Thelonius Monk” by Gershon D. Maller

2022: “Cemetery Carnival” by Susanne Kennedy

2021: “Drifters” by Rosanna E. Licari