The Poets & Writers Gala celebrates the indispensable contributions of writers both to our national discourse and to the inner lives of readers. The 2025 Gala, hosted by author Sloane Crosley, took place on Monday, March 24, at Pier Sixty in New York City. The event honored Kimberly Blaeser, Angie Cruz, and Kiese Laymon with the 2025 Writers for Writers Awards. Morgan Entrekin, Elisabeth Schmitz, and Peter Blackstock of Grove Atlantic each received the 2025 Editor’s Award. Learn more about the honorees here.
We extend grateful thanks to the generous supporter who made our 2025 Gala a resounding success. Under the leadership of gala chair Dominique Raccah, publisher and CEO of Sourcebooks, the event raised a record-breaking $1.35 million to support our programs and publications for writers.
The video below hightlights the impact of our work, made possible by the generous support of our community.
Find details about every creative writing competition—including poetry contests, short story competitions, essay contests, awards for novels, grants for translators, and more—that we’ve published in the Grants & Awards section of Poets & Writers Magazine during the past year. We carefully review the practices and policies of each contest before including it in the Writing Contests database, the most trusted resource for legitimate writing contests available anywhere.