THE OTTOLINE BOOK PRIZE IS OPEN FOR SUBMISSIONS.
***PLEASE SIGN UP FOR THE FENCE NEWSLETTER TO FIND OUT ABOUT UPCOMING SUBMISSION PERIODS, HERE.***
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Fence is published in print approximately one to two times per year.
In order to ensure Fence will have the required funds on hand to pay the printers we work with and the distributors who prepare the magazine for shipment and then send it forth, we ask for your support through a six-dollar reading fee.
Response time is between three and nine months.
Every submission that we receive, including yours, no matter how many arrive, will be closely read by one of our senior editors. After that initial round of reading, a small number of submissions are advanced to the next round of decision making, so that the editors as a group can discuss them and then select which will appear in the print issue and/or on the Fence website.
Please Note: Repeat publication by a contributor within the same field (poetry, fiction, translation, other) may take place only after at least four issues or two years have elapsed.
Contributors with work selected for print publication will be compensated at $50 and a one-year or two-issue subscription to Fence.
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Poetry: Please submit up to three poems and no more than ten pages of poetry per submission. You may submit as many times as you would like.
See PEOPLE for the list of Poetry Editors.
Fiction: Please limit your submission to one story of no more than 8000 words or three flash fictions of up to 1000 words each. Submissions containing more than one story or three flash fictions will not be read. Individuals are limited to one submission per submission period.
See PEOPLE for the list of Fiction Editors.
Other: This category allows submitters to self-define by choosing not to define their genre. Other is appropriate for work that is hybrid or otherwise not interested in saying what it is. Submit up to twelve pages of Other.
See PEOPLE for the list of Other Editors.
Translations: Cole Swensen is Translation Editor.
Text in originating language is preferred
New translations of previously translated work are welcome.
The above genre-specific page maximum and limits apply just the same for translation.
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We hope that you will become, if you are not already, an active and sustaining part of Fence not only through submitting your writing by also as an active, sustaining subscriber. We encourage you to read through issues of Fence. In turn, we will maintain an open and energetic space for the publication of new writing, and we will work to continue to connect that writing to an ever-expanding audience of current and new readers – through innovative design, distribution, and publicity.
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***OUR MISSION***
Fence maintains a venue, in print, aural, and digital forms, for writing that speaks across genre, sociocultural niche and ideological boundary as accessibly as it can, such that Fence publishes largely from its unsolicited submissions and is committed to the literature and art of queer writers and writers of color.
Fence encourages collective appreciation of variousness by inhering collectively outside of the constraints of opinion, trend, and market.
The name of the magazine comes from a John Ashbery poem, "Soonest Mended."
The Ottoline Book Prize is open to full-length poetry manuscripts by any person who identifies as a woman and/or female, including trans women as well as people of variable gender who were Assigned Female at Birth. People who identify as men are not eligible for this prize.
- An award of $5,000 will be paid upon publication.
- The selected book will be published in fall/winter 2027.
- The poet will be given a two-week residency at the T.S. Eliot House in Gloucester, Massachusetts.
- The book will be distributed throughout North America and internationally by Consortium Books / Ingram.
- The author will receive 40 complimentary books and royalties, as part of the contract with Fence Books.
- The first printing of 1,000 will be printed offset at Versa Press in East Peoria, Illinois.
- First round readers include Fence editors and volunteers.
- Emily Wallis Hughes and Jason Zuzga will select the manuscript for the Ottoline Book Prize, which they will edit in collaboration with the author.
- The submission fee is $25, and all entrants receive a complimentary two-issue subscription or renewal to Fence. International applicants will receive a digital subscription to Fence through Exact Editions.
Please review the following:
- First, second, third, fourth, and beyond books are welcome. Poets at any stage in their writing life, published or unpublished, are eligible to submit.
- Poets living in any country are welcome to submit their manuscripts. There are no limitations on country of origin or immigration status.
- Manuscripts should be at least 45 pages. There is no maximum page limit.
- Multilingual poetry manuscripts are welcome, as well as self-translations into English.
- Manuscripts may be submitted to other Fence Book submission calls simultaneously.
- Poetry created through collaboration is welcome. Please provide the contact information of your collaborator(s) in the ‘cover letter’ field. Your collaborators need to also qualify based on the Ottoline guidelines.
- Current and/or recent students and teaching colleagues of Emily Wallis Hughes and Jason Zuzga are ineligible to submit.
- Current Fence volunteers, editors, board members, and editorial advisors are ineligible to submit.
Fence Books is an imprint of Fence Magazine, Inc., a small, fully independent literary publisher. The reading fees help cover the editorial labor involved in the serious, deep process of fully considering each manuscript we receive and may be allocated to various necessary operational expenses.
Fence Magazine, Inc., a 501(c)(3) independent not-for-profit based in New York, is a member of the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses [CLMP].
While Fence does not read blind, the editors care deeply about editorial integrity; all Fence editors and readers agree to the "Editorial Guidelines and Code of Conduct" approved by the Board of Directors. Emily Wallis Hughes and Jason Zuzga take pride in reading objectively and are able to do so in the context of friendship and acquaintance.
Please write to Editorial Co-Directors Emily Wallis Hughes and Jason Zuzga at fence.fencebooks@gmail.com with any questions.