Bloomsbury Writing 2023

In 2023, in partnership with Bloomsbury Publishing, we ran a creative writing competition to give girls, young women and non-binary writers aged 19 or under the opportunity to have their creative work appear alongside bestselling authors Madeline Miller and Jennifer Saint. We asked entrants to submit a piece of creative writing of 1500 words or less, inspired by the classical world, and there were hundreds of amazing entries. See below for the results: huge congratulations to all of the long and short listed writers!

Winner

Cait Kremenstein – In the Bad Times

Cait’s brilliant story has been selected as the overall winning entry and will be published by Bloomsbury in the upcoming Women Re-Creating Classics: Contemporary Voices, co-edited by Dr Emily Hauser (author of the acclaimed For the Most Beautiful) and Dr Helena Taylor, where they foreground discussions and interviews between writers and academics, reflecting on why classical creative retellings are so popular now, and showcase fantastic contemporary receptions of Classics by women writers. Make sure to look out for this exciting publication and read In the Bad Times!

Listen here to our podcast interview with Cait about the inspiration for her winning story.