Winner of 2008 Louis Martz Prize

The recipient of this year’s Louis Martz Prize, generously funded by Dr. Scott Peterson, is Irene Hsiao’s essay, “Early William Carlos Williams: Bad Keats?” which appeared in volume 37 of The Cambridge Quarterly (2008).

Judges Peter Schmidt, Lisa Steinman, and August Kleinzahler praised Hsiao’s essay as “particularly provocative and original in its attention to the sonnet form and the evolution of form in Williams’s early poetry; it thus revisited the relationship between Keats and Williams in interesting ways.” The judges also awarded an honorable mention to Ian Flanagan’s essay, “Hearing the American Voice: Thomas Kinsella and William Carlos Williams,” which appeared in the Irish Studies Review (V. 16.3, August 2008).  The Society congratulates both Hsiao and Flanagan for their fine contributions to the field of Williams Studies, and also thanks our three judges for their hard work.

The Scott Peterson Prize for best essay in the William Carlos Williams Review for 2008 will be announced next year.

Since 2008 the Scott Peterson Prize and the Louis Martz Prize of $500 have each been awarded respectively to the best work published on Williams in the William Carlos Williams Review and outside the journal.