Peer Gynt literary competition deadline Wed
Malawi Writers Union (Mawu) has said the deadline for submission of entries into the first ever Peer Gynt literary competition is 5pm Wednesday.
According to an earlier announcement, all entries into the competition which is an adaptation of a popular Norwegian five- act play by Henrik Ibsen were supposed to be submitted by last week Friday.
Mawu president Sambalikagwa Mvona on Monday said his office extended the deadline of the competition to give a chance to some writers who are sending their entries through post office and couriers.
“We were expected to close by weekend, but I have been receiving contacts from various people asking if we have got their entries. Others were saying they had sent through courier and to be fair we just decided to extend the deadline by three days, and we believe there would be no excuses after today,” he said.
However, the president said the response for entries is very overwhelming. He said he has received many entries and will be disclosing the total figure of the entries by close of business Wednesday.
The competition is open to any person and the minimum words for each entry is 40 000. According to Mvona the objective is to produce an adult book manuscript which can be used in secondary schools and colleges.
“We want to promote reading culture among students and graduates by providing new and local publications. This is one of the ways of doing it. We will make sure all best manuscripts are available in schools and libraries of the country,” he said.
Mvona said the best three manuscripts will be sent outside the country for final editing and designing and will be printed into novels.
Apart from that, the best three will be awarded K500 000 (about $420), K300 000 (about $714) and K200 000 (about $476) cash respectively. Mvona added that there are also three consolation prizes to manuscripts on position four to six. The three will receive K50 000 (about $119) each.
He also said there is also a possibility of publishing the three in form of novels.
