The Propel Cambridge Poetry Prize
Submissions are now OPEN for The Propel Cambridge Poetry Prize 2026.
Entries close at 11.59pm UK 31 January 2026. Entries are free and to be made via our Submittable here. Please review the Submission Guidelines below carefully before submitting your entry.
About The Propel Cambridge Poetry Prize
PACE (Professional and Continuing Education) is the home of the Centre for Creative Writing at University of Cambridge. We're delighted to announce our updated part-time Master’s in Creative Writing course, where students will have the opportunity to study poetry across two years at Newnham College, Cambridge. To celebrate and mark the occasion, we’re collaborating with Propel Magazine to launch The Propel Cambridge Poetry Prize!
At the University of Cambridge, we offer the opportunity to specialise in poetry, fiction, or nonfiction, as well as a multi-disciplinary pathway that allows students to work in multiple genres of writing. Like Propel Magazine, our course aims to nurture emerging writers. Our poetry pathway gives students the chance to immerse themselves in specialist seminars and workshops over a two-year period, allowing talented poets to develop their craft and refine their voice. The Master’s programme is now open to applications for the 2026/2027 academic year with a deadline of 15th January 2026.
All shortlisted poets will be invited to an online workshop with Cambridge tutors. The winning poem will receive a prize of £750 and publication in Propel Magazine. The 2026 prize will be judged by Bhanu Kapil.
About the 2026 Judge - Bhanu Kapil
Bhanu Kapil is the author of seven books. Her newest collection, Autobiography of a Performance (the87press, 2025), is written with Blue Pieta, a dramaturg, choreographer, performer and multi-media artist. Bhanu is the winner of the T.S. Eliot Prize, a Windham-Campbell Prize (Yale University), a Cholmondeley Award (Society of Authors), and the 16th International Poetry and People Prize (China). A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she is a former Judith E. Wilson Poetry Fellow at the University of Cambridge and a current Fellow of Churchill College, where she is writing a novel on yellow paper. Kapil's blog can be found here: https://wasjackkerouacapunjabi.blogspot.com/
Prize Submission Guidelines
We accept submissions from poets writing in English, based anywhere in the world, who have yet to publish their first full-length poetry collection.
Submissions for 2025 will be open from 1 December 2025 to 11.59pm UK 31 January 2026. The shortlist will be announced at the end of April 2026.
We consider simultaneous submissions, but please let us know promptly if work you have submitted has been accepted for publication elsewhere.
Poets may enter one poem, up to three pages of A4 (at 12pt font with standard page margins) to be considered.
Poets may send one entry in a single word document (.doc, .docx format).
Poems must be unpublished online or in print.
All submissions must be your own original work and we do not accept submissions of work created or aided in creation by the use of generative AI or generative AI tools including but not limited to ChatGPT. The contest organisers reserve the right to determine, at their sole discretion, whether a submission violates these rules. By entering, you agree to these terms and confirm that your entry is your own original work, free from the use of AI.
Only poets who have not yet published (or, as at the date of submission, are not under contract with a publisher to publish) a full length collection of poetry are eligible to enter the Prize.
