Announcing the 2022 Porter Fleming Literary Competition Award Winners
The winners of the 2022 Porter Fleming Literary Competition have been announced by the Morris Museum of Art. They are:
FICTION
1st Place: Frank Honeycutt, Walhalla, South Carolina; Wrong Page
2nd Place: Karen Wiegman, Atlanta, Georgia; Dogstand, Godstand, Gaslight, Ho!
3rd Place: Roberta George, Valdosta, Georgia; Wild and Willowy
Judge: Matthew Null is a novelist (Honey from the Lion) and short story writer. 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 two-year residency at the American Academy in Rome, he is an Assistant Professor in the English Department at Susquenanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania.
NON-FICTION
1st Place: Timothy Brown, Spartanburg, South Carolina; Letter to Mom’s Neighborhood Watch Committee
2nd Place: Kangkang Kovacs, Mount Pleasant, South Carolina; Firecracker Bill
3rd Place: Beda Kantarjian, Longwood, Florida; Three Women on a Dark Street
Judge: Barry Yeoman is an award-winning journalist and radio documentarian who has taught at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy and Center for Documentary Studies. He currently teaches magazine writing to undergraduates at Wake Forest University and narrative non-fiction writing to adults at Duke University’s Center for Documentary Studies. He works with the non-profit Images & Voices of Hope where he coaches media professionals who are telling stories of community resilience.
PLAYS
1st Place: Jonathan Cook, North Augusta, South Carolina; Marigold
2nd Place: Matthew Buzzell, Augusta, Georgia; Rest Area
3rd Place: Devin Lovett, Augusta, Georgia; Other Ways
Judge: Ellen Hemphill is a playwright, screenwriter, actor, and the director of the award-winning Archipelago Theatre/Ciné in Chapel Hill, NC. She is also a Professor in the Duke University Theater Studies Department.
POETRY
1st Place: Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “Getting Smaller”
2nd Place: Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “Veterans Day”
3rd Place: Eric Nelson, Asheville, North Carolina; “My Father’s Parker 51”
Honorable Mentions:
Eric Nelson, Asheville, North Carolina; “Expecting Lowell”
Valerie Nieman, Riedsville, North Carolina; “Scene on 23rd Street, Harvest Moon”
Dannye Powell, Charlotte, North Carolina; “What I Kept Remembering After She Died”
Deborah Scott , Johns Island, South Carolina “One Lonely Afternoon” Inside a Russell Edson Poem
Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “Snake Handling”
Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “And I’m Not Making This Up”
Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “In the Pines”
Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “Slightly Before You Were Born”
Edward Wilson, Augusta, Georgia; “Coal Miner”
Judge: Alan Shapiro, the William R. Kenan, Jr. Distinguished Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is a renowned American poet. 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. Funded by the Porter Fleming Foundation, which is administered by the Trustees of the Academy of Richmond County, the competition is organized and administered by the Morris Museum of Art. The Porter Fleming 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.