DISQUIET International is happy to announce the winners of our 2014 Disquiet Literary Prize (in partnership with Guernica, NinthLetter.com, and The Collagist, and our largest contest to date), our scholarships for North American writers of Luso descent (in partnership with the Luso-American Development Foundation), and our first-ever Short Play Competition!

2014 DISQUIET Literary Prize Winners

each of whom will be published by one of our partner publications and receive a substantial tuition scholarship to DISQUIET 2014:

Poetry winner: “Hug Machine” by Colie Hoffman

Colie Hoffman is a poet, essayist, and recent transplant to Portland, OR from New York, where she received an MFA at Hunter College-CUNY. She spends many days of the week working at a travel research firm, where she translates English into different English. Colie has been a writer in residence at Writers Omi in upstate New York and at Sangam House in South India, for which she won the M Literary Residency. Her poems have appeared in Sixth Finch, TYPO, Blood Orange Review, and elsewhere.

Fiction winner: “Girls” by Laura Adamczyk

Laura Adamczyk was born and raised and still lives in Illinois. Her writing has won awards from the Union League Civic & Arts Foundation of Chicago and has appeared in the Chicago Reader, Ninth Letter, PANK, Passages North, The Rumpus, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Washington Square Review, and elsewhere. She earned an MFA in Fiction from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and currently reads submissions for the journal Creative Nonfiction.

Non-Fiction winner: “Sowing Cycles” by Daisy Pitkin

Daisy Pitkin grew up in rural Ohio with her three brothers. Previous to receiving an MFA from the University of Arizona, she spent nine years as a community and labor organizer, supporting the union campaigns of garment and industrial laundry workers around the world. Her essays were recently awarded CutBank’s Montana Prize, the Monique Wittig grant, and mentioned as “notable” in The Best American Essays 2013. She lives, writes, and teaches in Tucson.

The Grand Prize Winner

who will receive full tuition, accommodations, and airfare to DISQUIET 2014:

“Girls” (fiction) by Laura Adamczyk of Chicago, IL.

DISQUIET Literary Prize Finalists:

Fiction: Gerard Breitenbeck, Todd Covalcine, Robert Glick, Jean McGarry, Jenn Rossmann

Non-Fiction: Amina Asim, Kate Duva, Jennifer Hildebrandt, Henry Leung, Rick Whitaker

Poetry: Diana Arterian, Molly Damm, Lauren Hilger, Caitlin Scarano

Luso-American FLAD Scholarship Winners:

Winners of our Luso-American Scholarships will receive full tuition, accommodations, and airfare to DISQUIET 2014.

Caro Beth Clark

was raised in Rhode Island, has Maine plates, and moved to Washington by way of St. John and Alaska. She recently finished her MFA in Fiction at the University of New Hampshire and is now learning traditional wooden boat building in Port Townsend. She is rarely far from the water and known to fall in.

Hugo Dos Santos

was born in Lisbon and moved to Newark, New Jersey, with his family when was ten years of age. He is the author of two collections of poetry, Midday Epiphanies and Heartbroken Prophecies (2002) and The Deepest Depths of Shallow Ponds (2004), as well as of the e-book Ironbound: a blog (2012). His work has been featured in various publications in Portugal and the United States. Hugo has worked as a journalist, educator, and is  currently a test developer with Educational Testing Service. He resides in New Jersey with his wife, Fatima, and his dog, Gatsby, where he is working on his novel, Brick City.

Maggie Felisberto

is a 23-year-old student in the University of Tampa MFA in Creative Writing program, where she is studying fiction. She earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Nyack College and is a 2011 Disquiet alumnus. Maggie grew up in Pennsylvania, in a small town where most of her peers thought Portugal was in the Caribbean or South America until they met her. She has lived in provincial Buenos Aires and upstate New York, and she once again lives in rural Pennsylvania. In addition to writing fiction, Maggie blogs about life, music and literature semi-frequently. She dances tango del salón and in an emergency, she has been known to spend eleven dollars on a pound of salt cod to make pasteis de bacalhau.

Short Play Competition

The winner of our first annual Short Play Competition will receive full tuition, accommodations, and airfare to attend Jacqueline Goldfinger’s Playwritng workshop at DISQUIET. The winning play will also be staged in Lisbon during the conference.

Short Play Contest Winner:

“Cafe A Brasileira” by Elaine Ávila

Elaine Ávila’s plays have premiered in: Central America, (National Theatre of Panamá, Teatro Lagartija); throughout Canada, (Canadian Centre for Theatre Creation, Theatre SKAM); New York City (Ontological- Hysteric Theatre, Hybrid Theatre Works, Occupy the Empty Space Festival); throughout the U.S.; France (upcoming); and London, England (Tracey Neuls, Nordic Nomad). Recent/upcoming plays include Jane Austen, Action Figure, Quality: the Shoe Play, Lieutenant Nun, Burn Gloom, La Frontera/The Border, Santisima!, Social Media, Lost and Found in Fado. Awards include Victoria Critic’s Circle for Best New Play, Best Production/ Audience Favorite Festival de Cocos, Canada Council (numerous). She has taught in universities from British Columbia to Tasmania, China to Panamá. She has been published in NoPassport Press (Jane Austen Action Figure and other Plays, 2012, in 24 Gun Control Plays edited by Caridad Svich and Zac Kline, 2013), Canadian Theatre Review, American Theater, Contemporary Theatre Review, Lusitania.

Elaine is the former Endowed Chair and Head of the MFA Program in Dramatic Writing at the University of New Mexico, founder of the LEAP Playwriting Program at Vancouver’s Arts Club Theater, and currently a Playwrights Theatre Centre Associate. She was recently distinguished as a descendentes notáveis (Notable Descendant) for her theater work by the Government of the Azores, Portugal.

Congratulations to all our scholarship winners, contest winners and finalists!