Millay House Rockland Writer-in-Residence 2025

Millay House Rockland, in partnership with the Ellis Beauregard Foundation, is pleased to announce our open call for two, one-month, juried residencies for writers of poetry, fiction, non-fiction, screenplays, or expository journalism. 

Applications for the Writer-in-Residence program will open on Edna St. Vincent Millay's birthday Saturday, February 22, 2025, and will be accepted until Tuesday, April 1, 2025, at 11:59 pm EST. Two residents will be chosen, one for October 2025 and the other for July 2026. Each residency comes with a stipend of $1200 and one month's accommodation in the house where Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Edna St. Vincent Millay was born. 

This year’s final juror is Gretel Ehrlich, essayist and poet. She is the author of three books of narrative essays, a novel, two memoirs, three books of poetry, a biography, a book of ethnology, and a children’s book, among others. Her best-known book is perhaps The Solace of Open Spaces. Ehrlich’s books have received the PEN West Award for Nonfiction, the PEN New England Henry David Thoreau Award for Nature Writing, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award for Distinguished Prose, and a Whiting Award. She has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Selection Process and Timeline:

• Applications will be accepted from February 22, 2025, until April 1, 2025, at 11:59 pm EST. The first 100 submissions will be considered.

• A preliminary jury of five Maine writers, educators, and publishers will anonymously review all the submissions that successfully meet the submission guidelines outlined below. The preliminary jury will also remain anonymous until the winners are announced. 

• Following the review of submissions, the two selected candidates will be notified June 1, 2025, and the residents will be announced publicly on July 1, 2025.

Application Guidelines:

• Applicants must be U.S. citizens, 21 years old or older, and not currently enrolled in an educational program at the time of the residency.

• Relatives, close friends, and current students of the final judge—Gretel Ehrlich—are not eligible to enter. Staff and volunteers of Millay House Rockland are also not eligible to enter.

• Applicants must choose October 2025 or July 2026 on their application (or both if they want to be considered for either). 

• Applicants must submit their resume in a PDF format. 

• Applicants must submit examples of their work in a PDF format. Prose writers should submit up to 25 pages of a novel, short stories, play, or nonfiction writing, double spaced and formatted in 12-point type. Poets should submit no more than ten pages of poetry with each poem beginning on a new page, formatted in 12-point type. Works may be previously published or in process. Your written samples should not include your name or any contact information. 

• Applicants must submit a short statement about the project they plan to work on and why they want this residency.

• Each residency is open to one person only. No group projects will be considered.

• This is a solo residency: no partners, friends, or spouses may accompany the writer.

• Each resident chosen will be asked to offer one public event while they are in residence: a reading, workshop, or a conversation with writing students and/or the general public.