Saturday, August 27, 2016

Call for Readers/Screeners: The Baltic Writing Residency

The Baltic Writing Residency has expanded, and we are looking for both a poetry reader, and a fiction reader to contribute to the application screening process for each genre, in addition to our general screeners, and also to aid in some of the logistics of residencies and chapbook publication. These are volunteer positions.

The BWR is an international residency program for writers, founded in 2008, and with locations in Sweden, Scotland and Kentucky. Residents have included National Book Award finalists, those numbered in The New Yorker’s “Fiction Writers to Watch: 20 under 40,” as well as winners of Whiting Writer’s Awards, Guggenheim Fellowships, and PEN/O. Henry Awards.

Anyone holding, or currently a candidate for, an MFA or PhD interested in the positions is invited to be in touch at:

balticresidencyATgmailDOTcom (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

immediately. We are looking for readers who read widely across content and style, and who have broad aesthetic interests. Our winners and finalists range from the linear/conventional, to the conceptual/experimental, to the collaborative (though we receive very little sci-fi, fantasy, crime, YA, &c.), and so we value readers who can identify quality regardless of an applicant's approach to writing.

What we’d like from the prospective readers – all in the body of an email:


1. A list of the last 5-10 books of poetry or prose, depending on the genre for which they would like to screen, which they have read most recently.
2. A list of 10-15 books of poetry or of prose (again, depending on their preference for screening) published since 1980 that they most enjoyed.
3. A basic writer’s bio including where MFA and/or PhD was earned, and a list of any chapbook or book publication, though publication is by no means a requirement for the position.
4. Very briefly (in 200-250 words, or less) what it is the reader thinks they would be looking for in screening writing samples(disregard consideration of CV, publications, rec letters, &c). Try to be as specific as possible in describing what characteristics are seen most likely to sway the reader toward finding a work compelling enough to say that it is of high quality, highly enjoyable, &c.
5. An estimate of how many hours each week that can be contributed to working with the Baltic, keeping in mind that there will be weeks where there is nothing much to do, at all, and weeks when 1-8 hours of reading might be necessary.

Warm regards,
Adam Day


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