Announcing the 2021 Porter Fleming Literary Competition Award Winners
The Morris Museum of Art is proud to announce the winners of the 2021 Porter Fleming Literary Competition. They are:
FICTION
1st Place: Karen Wiegman, Atlanta, Georgia; Waving Goodbye to The Amy Rebecca
2nd Place: Amy Sladky, Edgefield, South Carolina; Round to Erehwon
3rd Place: Erin Davis, Charleston, South Carolina; Moon Ride
Honorable Mention:
Pamela Hayward, North Augusta, South Carolina; Jerry Rigged
Judge: Matthew Null, a novelist (Honey from the Lion) and short story writer, is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He is a winner of the O. Henry Award, the Mary McCarthy Prize, and the Joseph Brodksy Rome Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. After a residency at the American Academy in Rome, he taught in the English Department at Bryant University in Smithfield, Rhode Island, before moving to Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania, where he is an assistant professor, teaching creative writing and literature, at Susquehanna University.
NON-FICTION
1st Place: Timothy Brown, Spartanburg, South Carolina; A Good Dog Heads Home
2nd Place: William Davis, Aiken, South Carolina; When the Heart Hurts
3rd Place: Annette Reynolds, Effingham, South Carolina; Thirteen Seconds
Judge: Barry Yeoman is an award-winning journalist and radio documentarian who teaches narrative non-fiction writing at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy and Center for Documentary Studies and undergraduate writing courses at Wake Forest University. In addition to his own journalistic pursuits, he works with the non-profit “Images and Voices of Hop,” where he coaches media professionals who are telling stories of community resilience.
PLAYS
1st Place: Rick Davis, Augusta, Georgia; Replacement Value
2nd Place: Devin Lovett, Augusta, Georgia; Stranded
3rd Place: Rick Davis, Augusta, Georgia; Love in the Time of Covid
Judge: Ellen Hemphill, an award-winning poet and playwright, is an Associate Professor in the Theater Studies Department at Duke University. She is also the Artistic Director of Archipelago, a professional theater company in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
POETRY
1st Place: Justin Hunt, Charlotte, North Carolina; “Instructions for Writing to My Son: on the Tenth Anniversary of His Death”
2nd Place: Eric Nelson, Asheville, North Carolina; “Baton”
3rd Place: Monic Ductan, Cookeville, Tennessee; “Confederate”
Honorable Mentions:
Gilbert Allen, Travelers Rest, South Carolina; “The Heaven of Mistaken Assumptions”
Pat Keller, Hawkinsville, Georgia; “Sightings”, “From Darkness”, and “This October”
Joseph Kitchens, Jasper, Georgia; “Dirt Road” and Boarding House”
Dannye Powell, Charlotte, North Carolina; “The Year I Sat Next to the Talking Jesus” and “Trick of the Eye”
Catherine Zickgraf, Evans, Georgia; “The Glamour” and “Wintering Over in Pennsylvania”
Judge: Alan Shapiro, a renowned American poet, is the William R. Kenan Distinguished Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is the author of thirteen collections of poetry, including Tantalus in Love, Song and Dance, Dead Alive and Busy, as well as two memoirs, Vigil and The Last Happy Occasion.
The Porter Fleming Literary Competition, recognizing talented writers who reside in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee, was established in 1993 by Shirley Fleming to honor her late father, noted author and artist Berry Fleming. The competition is funded by the Porter Fleming Foundation, which is administered by the Trustees of the Academy of Richmond County. The foundation was established by Berry Fleming in 1963 as a memorial to his father, Porter Fleming, a prominent Augustan and one of the city’s leading philanthropists.