Salveson Prizes awarded

The Salveson Prizes in poetry and prose were awarded to Marisa Donnelly and Barb Lange. Judge Brandon Courtney is an established poet who was raised in Iowa and graduated from the MFA program at Hollins University in Roanoke, Va.

Salveson Prize winner in prose, Barb Lange.

Lange’s winning prose work, “Facing the Music,” was a piece she said she created over the course of a year. She began it in a creative writing class and slowly revised and edited it with the help and feedback of other students.

“I just kept working on it and finally got it to a point where I thought it was done,” she said, though, “I’m always afraid it’s not good enough.” The piece was good enough to win the prize, however; Courtney called her piece “beautiful,” “confident” and “seamless.” Lange said that it felt good to get outside confirmation that the writing she does is worthwhile.

Donnelly’s winning poetry work was titled “Reasons Why I Love My Mother.” Courtney chose Donnelly’s poem based on her skill and control of line endings and use of visual, vibrant colors in her poem; he compared her to poets like William Carlos Williams and likened the techniques used to those used in traditional Chinese poetry.

Donnelly said, “I write for myself, I write because I feel that I have something to say, and I also write to connect to others.”

The Salveson Prize is an annual award that is open for submissions from the entire campus. In addition to the two winners, honorable mentions were also awarded to April DeVries-Calteux and Kaylin Tlam in poetry, and Tori Lagel and Marisa Donnelly in prose. The winners each received a $25 award for winning the Salveson.