6th June, 2017

The 2017 YWSP opens for entries as Imagining History workshops begin

The 2017 Young Walter Scott Prize is now open for entries. Budding young historical novelists aged between 11 and 19 have until 31st October 2017 to enter the creative writing competition, with a chance to win a £500 travel grant and a VIP invitation to one of the UK’s best book festivals in 2018.

Meanwhile, the Imagining History creative writing workshops have begun across the UK, in places of exceptional historical interest, from castles and country houses, to archaeological sites and maritime museums.  Both the writing prize and the workshops aim to inspire young writers to play with ideas, to explore the cracks between historical facts, and to become the historical novelists of the future.

Participants in the Imagining History workshops in June and July are encouraged to enter their stories for the prize, now in its third year.  Judges are looking for a piece of creative writing between 800 and 2000 words, inspired by any aspect of the past – an actual historical event, place or person. It simply has to be set in a time before the writer was born – a time recognisably different from the present.

Entries will be judged in two categories – 11 to 15 years and 16 to 19 years. The winners of each category win a £500 travel grant to enable them to visit the historic site of their choice anywhere in the UK, and a VIP invitation to the Borders Book Festival in Melrose, Scotland, in June 2018, to receive their prizes. Two runners-up in each category receive a book token, and all four winning stories are published in a special YWSP anthology book.

All the details, and prize rules, are on our How To Enter page, and you can find details of our exciting Imagining History programme of creative writing workshops in historic and inspiring locations, on our Inspirations page.