Publishing aspiring poets

Rudi van Wyk, founder of Shefa Publishing, is back again with another poetry and short story competition.

The Sheffield-based poet said many poets do not know where to go with their poems and how to publish them.

“I feel poetry is really beautiful and speaks to different people in unique ways and it should be seen by the world. There is a big market for writers but none for poets,” she said.

Which is why she started publishing.

In 2011 Van Wyk published her first poetry and short story book, ‘Digters van die toekoms’, a collection of poems divided into four categories: Christian, Love, General and Goth.

She did this by launching a poetry competition where new amateur poets and writers had the opportunity to see their work published.

Each poet paid an entry fee and submitted a poem or short story according to the four categories with the hopes of it being chosen for publishing.

The top three poems were chosen and won cash prizes.

Van Wyk is now launching her second poetry and short story competition, with entries open until the end of July.

This year she has opened the competition up to the youth encouraging aspiring writers, no matter their age, to submit their work.

Two books will be published with the children’s poem collection to be called “Writers of the future” with each poets name and age printed under their poem titles.

Entry fee is only R30 per poem submission and R75 per short story.

Prizes are R1000, R500 and R250 for first, second and third place respectively.

“I want to try uplift writers not bring them down, so I try squeeze as many of the submitted poems into the book as possible.”

Van Wyk offers her expertise and guidance to amateur writers.

“My aim is to get stories published that would otherwise go unnoticed. There is so much unknown talent out there.”

Contact Rudi at shefasolutions@gmail.com or call 079 367 5569.