The Duke University English Department is honored to announce the winners of its 2025 writing contests. The department administers writing contests to recognize fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry and critical writing by English majors and non-major undergraduates.
FICTION
Anne Flexner Memorial Award for Fiction
Family members and friends of former English student Anne Flexner (1945) established the Anne Flexner Memorial Award for Creative Writing to recognize undergraduates for their work in fiction and poetry.
Co-winners:
Linda Garziera, 2028 for “The Venetian Mask Maker” & Emma Huang, 2025 for “Qingdao”
Reynolds Price Fiction Award
The Reynolds Price Fiction Award was established in memory of the distinguished novelist, essayist, poet, and public intellectual Reynolds Price, a graduate of Duke and professor in the English Department for over 50 years.
First prize: Audie Waller, 2028 for “Catherine”
CREATIVE NONFICTION
Anne Flexner Memorial Award for NonFiction
Family members and friends of former English student Anne Flexner (1945) established the Anne Flexner Memorial Award for Creative Writing to recognize undergraduates for their work in nonfiction.
First prize: Tanya Wan, 2028 for “On Ships that Pass in the Night”
Second prize: Jessica Lewin, 2027 for “Lombard Street”
George P. Lucaci Creative Nonfiction Award
This award was created to encourage creative nonfiction writing and honor George P. Lucaci, a former Duke student who has actively supported undergraduate creative writing in the English Department for many years.
First prize: Tyler King, 2025 for “Abecedarians”
POETRY
Anne Flexner Memorial Award for Poetry
Family members and friends of former English student Anne Flexner (1945) established the Anne Flexner Memorial Award for Creative Writing to recognize undergraduates for their work in fiction and poetry.
First prize: Arielle Stern, 2025 for “Certain Confluence”
Second prize: Adolya Moore, 2026 for “white low tops & red lip gloss”
Terry Welby Tyler Award for Poetry:
This award was established by the family of Terry Welby Tyler, Jr., who would have graduated with the class of 1997 to recognize and honor outstanding undergraduate poetry.
First prize: Mia Xie, 2026 for “The Ethics of Memory”
Academy of American Poets
Founded in 1934 in New York City, the Academy of American Poets is the largest membership-based nonprofit organization advocating for American poets and poetry. Its mission is to support American poets at all stages of their careers and foster contemporary poetry appreciation.
First prize: Tyler King, 2025 for “Double Theory of the Moon”
Honorable mention: Matthew Chen, 2026 for “The Feather of That Bird”
Creative Writing Scholarship Awards
Frances Pemberton Scholarship
This scholarship is awarded to a junior or senior pursuing creative writing studies. It was created by the Trustees of The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation in memory and honor of Francis Pemberton's service to the Biddle Foundation.
Divine Ebisike, 2026
Margaret Rose Knight Sanford Scholarship
Given annually to a female student who demonstrates a particular promise in creative writing, this scholarship was established to recognize the untiring efforts of Margaret Rose Knight Sanford on behalf of Duke University.
Gabi Carter, 2025
Polyna Uzun, 2025
William Blackburn Scholarship
Created in 1962 by students and friends of Professor William Blackburn (1899-1969), who established the creative writing initiative at Duke, this scholarship recognizes outstanding achievement in the field of creative writing.
Sage Cooley, 2025
Emerson Eickholt, 2028
Sarah Pusser, 2028
Critical Essay & Department Awards
Stanley E. Fish Award for Outstanding Work in British & Anglophone Literature
This award recognizes outstanding work by an undergraduate enrolled in an English course in British Literature.
Octavia Chilkoti, '25 - “A Spectral Image Renewed: Recursive Dialogues Between Phantasmagoria and Gothic Fiction”
Louis J. Budd Award for Outstanding Work in American Literature
This award recognizes outstanding work by an undergraduate enrolled in an English course in American Literature.
Charlotte Gehring, '25 - “Fatal Attraction: Murder and the American Dream in 20th- and 21st-Century American Literature”
Barbara Herrnstein Smith Award for Outstanding Work in Literary Theory
This award recognizes outstanding work by an undergraduate enrolled in an English course in literary theory or criticism.
Arielle Stern, '25 - “Inventions of Farewell: The Non-Phenomenality of Death in Modernist Poetics”
Victor Strandberg Award for Excellence in the Literary Arts
This award, made possible by the Seinfeld family, recognizes an undergraduate for excellence in the literary arts.
Co-winners:
Natalie Farris, '25 - “Christina Hans” and selected non-fiction
Charlotte Haidar, '25 - “Women in Absentia”
Most Original Thesis:
This award recognizes a senior student for writing the most original honors thesis.
Tyler King, '25 - "Subluminal Messages"
Critical Essay Prize
Each year Duke English sponsors a critical essay competition that is open for essays written by any Duke undergraduate enrolled in an English department course. Submissions must be critical essays of nonfiction produced for a class during the current academic year in which the student is enrolled.
Trisha Santanam, '26 - “Jailhouse Blues: The Music of Parchman Farm”
Honorable Mentions:
- Sarine Krovitz, '25 - “The Bookseller and the Self-Hating Jew: On Mihail Sebastian’s For Two Thousand Years”
- Annabel Tang, '27 - “Magical Realism, Cultural Hegemony, and the Problem of Canonization in Song of Solomon”
Bascom Headen Palmer Literary Prize
Awarded annually by the Program in Literature to recognize the best senior honors thesis in literary study each spring. Faculty nominate annually in early April.
Vivian Guo, '25 - “The Ethics of Melancholia: Lacan, Loss, and the Limits of Meaning in Everything Everywhere All At Once”