legacy contests

Inspired by Maya Angelou’s powerful lyrical voice and unbreakable spirit, this contest invites you to write your own piece that reflects resilience, transformation, and inner strength.

 

Angelou’s poetry speaks to the soul — bold, honest, and full of rhythm. Whether rooted in personal experience or imaginative storytelling, your submission should move with purpose and pulse.

Write like Jane. Observe like Jane. Judge like Jane. In this contest, you're tasked with starting a short satirical novel of manners — a witty glimpse into society, status, and quiet rebellion.

 

Use irony and observation to expose the flaws of your characters and their world, just like Austen might have in the age of texting and TikTok.

Ray Bradbury wrote across galaxies—but his heart always stayed close to home. His stories brim with imagination, but they never forgot childhood, wonder, or loss.

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In this contest, craft a short, emotionally-driven story that blends memory, place, or childhood with one speculative or futuristic twist. Think warm nights, small towns, lost innocence—with a telescope to the stars.

Borges turned literature into a labyrinth—where ideas folded inward and fiction blurred with philosophy.

 

This contest invites you to write a story that twists back on itself: a mystery, a dream, or a paradox. Craft a narrative puzzle with elegant language, unexpected turns, and meaning that feels just out of reach.

Dickens filled his novels with unforgettable characters—both grotesque and grand. This contest invites you to create a vivid character sketch, full of personality, quirk, and backstory.

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Look around your community—who seems “larger than life”? Introduce us to them with charm, detail, and Dickensian flair.

T.S. Eliot shattered traditional forms to reflect a broken, modern world. His poetry was a collage of culture, memory, and myth—often beautiful, often bleak.

 

In this contest, write a fragmented piece (poem, hybrid, or prose) that captures disconnection, disillusionment, or decay. Use form as feeling: let your structure echo your theme.

Fitzgerald wrote of the Roaring Twenties with dazzling detail—and deep melancholy beneath the glitter. His stories swayed with jazz, champagne, and heartbreak.

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In this contest, write a story set in the 1920s that captures the era’s glamour and gloom. Think lush settings, magnetic characters, and the ache behind the excess.

García Márquez blurred the boundary between the real and the unreal. His stories treated miracles like mundane facts and made the everyday shimmer with myth.

 

This contest asks you to write a story where magic simply exists. Blend fantasy with reality, myth with memory. Let the impossible feel inevitable.

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Channel your inner librarian, philosopher, or dreamer.

Hemingway believed that less said more. His Iceberg Theory left emotion beneath the surface, and every word mattered.

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Write a complete story in 300 words or fewer. Be subtle. Be spare. Let the silences speak louder than what’s said.

Kafka turned paperwork into nightmares. His stories made everyday systems strange, unsettling, and surreal.

 

In this contest, write a story set in a school, office, or institution that spirals into absurdity. Include one bizarre rule or document.

 

Find inspiration in a time you faced frustrating bureaucracy or an absurd paperwork process.

Murakami begins with the ordinary and slides—quietly, eerily—into the surreal. Talking cats, parallel worlds, and jazz records become metaphors for memory and loss.

 

This contest invites you to begin with something simple—a phone call, a sandwich, a train ride—and slowly bend reality. Let the surreal unfold with subtle mystery.

Orwell wrote futures that felt too close for comfort. His stories warned us what might happen when truth is twisted and freedom fades.

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Write a 750–1,000 word story set in a world where today’s concerns have grown extreme. Include a character who dares to resist. Make it clean, chilling, and politically sharp.

Poe ventured into the darkest corners of the human mind. His tales pulsed with obsession, madness, and dread.

 

In this contest, write a gothic horror story that spirals downward—into fear, fixation, or decay. Include one symbolic object. Let the horror haunt the page.

Plath turned emotion into metaphor. Her writing was raw, lyrical, and painfully precise—revealing entire inner worlds in a single image.

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This contest invites you to reflect on a powerful emotion through poetic or prose language. Use setting, metaphor, or memory to translate feeling into vivid art.

Let the light shine through your lines.

 

Rumi’s poetry reached for the soul. His verses moved through grief, longing, love, and the eternal—all with grace and insight.

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Write a verse that explores wisdom gained through personal experience. Make it spiritual, emotional, and lyrically beautiful.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is a textbook example of horror—it was also the birth of science fiction. Her questions about science, creation, and responsibility still resonate today.

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In this contest, create a short story that introduces a new invention—and shows its unintended consequences. Be bold, be thoughtful, be just a little terrifying.

Vonnegut made us laugh—and then feel the weight of what we were laughing at. His stories were full of absurdity, sadness, and brutal clarity.

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Write a satirical sci-fi piece under 1,000 words. Use dark humor to critique something serious. Be sharp, strange, and bold enough to say what others won’t.

Wilde turned charm into critique. His witticisms cut deep, and his characters wore their vices like velvet.

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In this contest, write a short story full of clever dialogue, biting satire, and stylish indulgence. Let your character bask in beauty, vanity, or vice—and make us adore them for it.

Woolf showed us that inner thoughts matter as much as outward events. Her prose flowed like thought itself—lyrical, layered, and alive.

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In this contest, write a passage that follows a character’s inner voice during a single moment. Plot is optional. Emotion is not.