Former student makes headlines in literature
The recent winner of the third annual Kenneth and Geraldine Gell Poetry Prize is Teresa Middleton, a UIndy alumna and Greenwood resident. Middleton won the award for her manuscript entitled “Junk DNA: A collection of sonnets.”
Middleton discussed her surprising win.
“It’s almost like a crap shot and a big gamble,” Middleton said. There are tons of great writers out there. I submitted 25 manuscripts and am pleased to finally have my piece published.”
Former Poet Laureate of Maine Baron Wormser judged her piece.
“The wonder of this book is how Teresa Middleton has taken a centuries-old form and made it her own, for what distinguishes these sonnets is their remarkable legerity,” Wormser said. “These poems dance. The rhymes are not impediments; they are spurs to continuous feats of fancy, insight, narrative and reflection.”
Middleton described the overall theme of her 100 sonnets as random. Each sonnet was organized into a strand, similar to the structure of DNA and each strand has its own theme. Some of the themes included in the strands are about music and composers, inventors and their inventions, famous men and famous women, Middleton even included a sonnet about particular places.
Overall her piece took her approximately five years to complete.
Overall, Middleton described her writing experience as something she really enjoyed.
“I really liked that I didn’t plan it in advance. Each idea was free flowing and I surrender myself to the creative process,” Middleton said.
The winner of the third annual Kenneth and Geraldine Gell Poetry Prize gets his or her piece published in the fall of 2010 by Big Pencil Press, the publishing imprint of Writers & Books, an additional cash prize of $1000 and a week at the Gell retreat center in the Finger Lake region of New York.
