Margarita Donnelly Prize for Prose Writing
Prize: $500 cash prize. Winner will be published in CALYX Journal Vol. 36:3, Summer/Fall 2027. Winner and up to two finalists will receive a one-volume subscription to CALYX Journal and publication on CALYX’s website.
Dates: July 1 – September 30, 2026, postmarked
Final Judge: Kate Carroll de Gutes
Please submit up to 10,000 words of unpublished fiction or creative nonfiction. One piece of prose per submission. Simultaneous submissions are discouraged. The CALYX editorial collective reads all manuscripts first, then selects 5-10 finalists to send to the final judge.
AI Policy: CALYX has a strict anti-AI policy. Please do not submit any work that has been generated using AI tools (spellcheck and grammar check tools are okay).
For postal submissions:
Please send single submission, cover letter with name and contact information, and $20 reading fee (checks payable to CALYX, Inc.).
Send materials to:
CALYX, Inc.
Margarita Donnelly Prize
PO Box B
Corvallis, OR 97339
For online submissions:
Please upload one prose piece (10,000 word maximum) in a single .doc, .docx, .rtf, or .pdx file to our online submission manager. Reading fee ($20 + $1 PayPal processing fee) is payable with Visa or Mastercard through our secure online payment portal. Do not include your name on the submissions—each will be read blind.
As many have become more vocal about their opposition to gender presentation and identity, Kate Carroll de Gutes feels urgently the need to counter and subvert traditional images, ideas, and narratives of masculine-of-center women, aka butches. Kate is at work on Will We See You in Something More Feminine Tomorrow: Fragments from the Frontline of the Gender Wars. The memoir is a reckoning, unfiltered and authentic. It’s the story of how Kate uncovered the subtle but powerful ways culture molded their understanding of gender presentation and identity, and the circuitous and sometimes odd journey Kate took to reimagine and embody who they truly are. Kate’s memoir Objects In Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear won the Oregon Book Award, a Lambda Literary Award, and an Indie’s First Gold. Their memoir The Authenticity Experiment won an IPPY for LGTBQ essay.
About the Contest
Margarita Donnelly was one of the four founders of CALYX, as well as its director, editor, manager, energy, and soul. Her incredible spirit and passion kept the journal running for nearly four decades. Now in its eleventh year, the first contest in her honor highlights the love, talent, and skill she brought to the arts, especially in the world of prose.