Our 2024 Young Person's Poetry Competition is now live - with Head Judge Rachel Piercey!
In celebration of the work of the Cornish poet Charles Causley, the Young Person’s Poetry Competition 2024 aims to encourage and enable young writers to have a go at writing poetry themselves. Charles wrote prolifically for adults and for young people and much of his inspiration came from folklore and myths, writing about elves, changelings, wizards, ghosts, mermaids, incantations and curses.
Read on for all the information you need to enter!
With this in mind, we want the young poets of the future to be inspired to write their own poetry responding to this year’s theme of ‘Magic’. You can enter through your school, as part of a group, or you can enter as an individual.
The competition is open to all young people aged between 5 and 18 years old who live anywhere in the UK and is free to enter. Poems will be judged by Rachel Piercey and a panel of poetry judges with prizes awarded for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and Highly Commended places in each category. This year we will also have an honourable mention for a young poet based in Cornwall. We aim to present our awards at the North Cornwall Book Festival.
- Entries are free.
- Entries are made by emailing poems and entry forms to admin@causleytrust.org
- The poet’s name or other identifying marks or details must not appear on the poem sheet itself. There should be no identifying marks other than the title.
- Poems: 40 lines of text maximum, no minimum. The title is not included in the line count. Lines between text/stanzas are not counted in the line count. Titles, epigraphs and dedications are also not counted as lines.
- Any entries submitted post 1st April 2024 will not be considered for our competition.
