The Austin Clarke Prize in Literary Excellence is now open! The Austin Clarke Prize in Literary Excellence serves to honour the memory of Austin Clarke (1934-2016). Clarke was, above all else, an exceptional writer, one who disrupted the expectations of what Canadian literature could and should become. His literary career was characterized by impressive productivity. In the span of his lifetime, he published eleven novels (including his 2002 Giller-winning The Polished Hoe), nine short story collections, two poetry collections, along with a number of memoirs. In this large body of work, he continually questioned the homogeneity implied with the development of a Canadian cultural establishment. He was deeply critical of the official Canadian position of multiculturalism, but to consider his work a “realist or sociological account of Black life in Canada” would be, as Paul Barrett notes in the introduction to his 2017 “‘Membering Austin Clarke: A Puritan Special Issue,” a fundamental misreading of the value of his writing. Although Clarke began his writing career as a reporter at the Timmins Daily Press and The Globe and Mail, his vast body of literary work has “never been realist, nor has it ever been reportage: it is a polyvocal, hybridizing, experimental, introspective, satirical, patriarchal, offensive, provocative and—at times—outraged artistic reflection on life in Canada” which “demands” a stylistic account.

   We at The Ex-Puritan agree. We have long been admirers of Clarke’s work, and with this renaming our annual literary award, we want to encourage our readers and writers to think through what it means to rebuke the Canadian cultural establishment. We want our writers to continue Clarke’s legacy by reimagining the boundaries of Canadian literature. Equally important to this, however, is a focus on style. Although we divide this award by entries into fiction and poetry, we want our submitters to reimagine the boundaries of what fiction and poetry can look like. We actively encourage submissions that are experimental with form and unrelentingly demand an attention to their style. We believe that Austin Clarke would’ve wanted nothing less.

   This year, the winners will be selected by Iryn Tushabe (for fiction) and Faith Arkorful (for poetry). Past judges have included Canisia Lubrin and Liz Howard. 

   Winners in each category will receive:  

     First Prize: $1,000  

     Runner-up: $200  We will announce our shortlist at the end of November and announce the winners in early  December.  

   All submissions must be written in 11 or 12 point font. The documents must be .doc, .odt or .rtf files and must not have identifying information on them to ensure a blind process reading process (remove your name, address, and contact information from the document itself). For short story contest submissions, please include a word count. No works over 7,500 words or under 1,000 will be accepted or read. Each submission to the poetry contest can include up to 4 poems, or up to 4 pages (whichever comes first). No AI-generated work will be accepted. We welcome multiple entries in either genre. Entries must be previously unpublished, original work.
 

PLEASE NOTE: Only single-authored submissions will be accepted. While we accept collaborative works (work written by more than one person) for our regular submissions, collaborative works submitted to the Austin Clarke Prize will be automatically disqualified.

    The entrance fee this year is $20, which helps us pay for the prize and compensate our judges with modest honorariums.  

    The deadline to enter is 11:59pm EST on October 24, 2025.

The Austin Clarke Prize in Literary Excellence is now open! The Austin Clarke Prize in Literary Excellence serves to honour the memory of Austin Clarke (1934-2016). Clarke was, above all else, an exceptional writer, one who disrupted the expectations of what Canadian literature could and should become. His literary career was characterized by impressive productivity. In the span of his lifetime, he published eleven novels (including his 2002 Giller-winning The Polished Hoe), nine short story collections, two poetry collections, along with a number of memoirs. In this large body of work, he continually questioned the homogeneity implied with the development of a Canadian cultural establishment. He was deeply critical of the official Canadian position of multiculturalism, but to consider his work a “realist or sociological account of Black life in Canada” would be, as Paul Barrett notes in the introduction to his 2017 “‘Membering Austin Clarke: A Puritan Special Issue,” a fundamental misreading of the value of his writing. Although Clarke began his writing career as a reporter at the Timmins Daily Press and The Globe and Mail, his vast body of literary work has “never been realist, nor has it ever been reportage: it is a polyvocal, hybridizing, experimental, introspective, satirical, patriarchal, offensive, provocative and—at times—outraged artistic reflection on life in Canada” which “demands” a stylistic account.

    We at The Ex-Puritan agree. We have long been admirers of Clarke’s work, and with this renaming our annual literary award, we want to encourage our readers and writers to think through what it means to rebuke the Canadian cultural establishment. We want our writers to continue Clarke’s legacy by reimagining the boundaries of Canadian literature. Equally important to this, however, is a focus on style. Although we divide this award by entries into fiction and poetry, we want our submitters to reimagine the boundaries of what fiction and poetry can look like. We actively encourage submissions that are experimental with form and unrelentingly demand an attention to their style. We believe that Austin Clarke would’ve wanted nothing less.

       This year, the winners will be selected by Iryn Tushabe (for fiction) and Faith Arkorful (for poetry). Past judges have included Canisia Lubrin and Liz Howard. 

Winners in each category will receive:

     First Prize: $1,000

     Runner-up: $200

     We will announce our shortlist at the end of November and announce the winners in early December.

     All submissions must be written in 11 or 12 point font. The documents must be .doc, .odt or .rtf files and must not have identifying information on them to ensure a blind process reading process (remove your name, address, and contact information from the document itself). For short story contest submissions, please include a word count. No works over 7,500 words or under 1,000 will be accepted or read. Each submission to the poetry contest can include up to 4 poems, or up to 4 pages (whichever comes first). We welcome multiple entries in either genre. No AI generated work will be accepted. Entries must be previously unpublished, original work.

PLEASE NOTE: Only single-authored submissions will be accepted. While we accept collaborative works (work written by more than one person) for our regular submissions, collaborative works submitted to the Austin Clarke Prize will be automatically disqualified.

     The entrance fee this year is $20, which helps us pay for the prize and compensate our judges with modest honorariums.

     The deadline to enter is 11:59pm EST on October 24, 2025. 

Essays must be original and unpublished. 

Please double-space your work, make the font 12 point, add page numbers, and include the word count on the first page. Maximum word count is 5000 words. Submissions that do not adhere to these guidelines will be rejected. 

Please ensure you are submitting to the correct category. Please only submit your creative non-fiction essays to this category. Please do not submit poetry or fiction. 

We are looking for:

• Essays that play with structure, POV, and chronology. Hermit crab essays are particularly encouraged.
• Essays that use a powerful metaphor to serve as a through line for theme and plot. 
• Essays that explore the liminal spaces, the overlooked, and the marginal.
• Essays that use fiction techniques like characterization, dialogue, and scenes to create narrative tension.
• Essays that use alternative forms to explore theme and build layers of meaning. 

We are not looking for:

• Service journalism
• Essays that primarily review a film, book, or artwork
• Academic essays
• Essays written for a class
• Travel essays
• Opinion pieces or argumentative essays
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  Please Note: All Austin Clarke Prize for Literary Excellence entries must be accompanied by a payment of $20; however, this category is free of charge! You also have the option of giving The Ex-Puritan a tip of $3, should you wish to contribute to the overall costs of running the magazine. But thanks for your submission regardless!  
  
  If submissions have been disabled on this category, it's because we've reached our monthly limit. We can only accept a limited number of no-fee submissions each month. You can either submit to one of our fee submissions categories or wait until we reopen on the 1st of the next month. All of our submissions are considered equally.
  
  Open until Sept 25.

Feel encouraged to push boundaries, play with form, and explore genre elements. Consider reading the fiction in our last few issues to familiarize yourself with work we've published. Please do not submit stories over 10,000 words, flash fiction (under 1,000 words), or novel excerpts. Please only send one story at a time. Note that all submissions must be previously unpublished and that we will not publish the same author more than once per year.We are especially interested in work by LGBTQ2S+ writers, BIPOC writers, and writing from other marginalized folks.

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Please Note: All Austin Clarke Prize for Literary Excellence entries must be accompanied by a payment of $20; however, this category is free of charge! You also have the option of giving The Ex-Puritan a tip of $3, should you wish to contribute to the overall costs of running the magazine. But thanks for your submission regardless!

If submissions have been disabled on this category, it's because we've reached our monthly limit. We can only accept a limited number of no-fee submissions each month. You can either submit to one of our fee submissions categories or wait until we reopen on the 1st of the next month. All of our submissions are considered equally.   

Open until Sept 25th

Books! Books! Books!

We publish reviews of CanLit books (1200-3000 words), especially by marginalized & debut authors. We love reviews of chapbooks; we love reviews both experimental and traditional. We are especially interested in work by LGBTQ2S+ writers, BIPOC writers, and writing from other marginalized folks.

Reviews doesn’t require a full draft; a pitch is acceptable as long as it is fully thought out and justified. If you are submitting a draft, please submit it double-spaced in 12 point font. Please only send one review at a time; note that it must be previously unpublished and that we will not publish the same author more than once per year. We do our best to respond to all submissions within 4 months. If you don't receive a response within that time, feel free to follow up!


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Please Note: All Austin Clarke Prize for Literary Excellence entries must be accompanied by a payment of $20; however, this category is free of charge! You also have the option of giving The Ex-Puritan a tip of $3, should you wish to contribute to the overall costs of running the magazine. But thanks for your submission regardless!

If submissions have been disabled on this category, it's because we've reached our monthly limit. We can only accept a limited number of no-fee submissions each month. You can either submit to one of our fee submissions categories or wait until we reopen on the 1st of the next month. All of our submissions are considered equally.   

Open until Sept 25th