The Nelson and District Arts Council and Elephant Mountain Literary Festival request assistance in nominating emerging writers in West Kootenay communities for the 7th Annual Carver Award, which comes with a $500 cash prize and presentation at the Festival’s ‘Wine and Crime’ Gala in Nelson on July 12, 2019.
Nominations must be for writers just starting in their careers who have had one to two books published, or an equivalent body of work published in anthologies or literary journals. To meet the criteria writing must be creative, literary writing (fiction or nonfiction). Self-published authors are eligible. Nominees must be a resident of the West Kootenays. (This includes Creston.)
Nominations must include name and contact information for both the nominator and the nominee, writing discipline (fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, teen, children’s, etc), titles of published works and their publishers, and a paragraph outlining the reason for the nomination.
Richard Carver was a lover of the arts and the Kootenays, and he was invested in the community. He was a mover and shaker on the board of the Nelson and District Arts Council, the primary sponsor of this award named in his honour. His daughter and arts lover herself Jocelyn Carver has continued the family’s generous support of this award.
“Richard believed in creative endeavour for its own sake,” says friend and EMLF committee member Anne DeGrace. “He believed in the process, and he was always generous with his encouragement.”
After Richard passed away in 2009, the Arts Council founded this award, which has been awarded six times. Children’s author Darcee O’Hearne was the recipient in 2013, followed by poet Jane Byers in 2014. In 2015 the Elephant Mountain Literary Festival became a partner in the award, and that year the award was split between two deserving authors, Susan Dancer, and Avi Silberstein. The recipients in 2016 were Donna MacDonald and Alanda Greene. In 2017 the recipient was Diana Morita Cole and in 2018 for the 6th annual award, it was split again and bestowed on Morty Mint and Ernst Hekkanen.
For more information, please visit the Nelson and District Arts Council website at www.ndac.ca. Nominations and inquiries may be sent to richardcarveraward@gmail.com with “Carver Award” in the subject line. The deadline for nominations is Friday, May 17th, 2019.