Frequently asked questions:

How do I submit a work?

If you are an author, agent, or publisher wishing to submit a work, please consult our Submissions page.

What does winning The Barbellion Prize entail?

Each of the four shortlisted authors will receive the sum of £500, with an additional £500 and a unique trophy for the overall winner.

We aim in time to increase the value of the prize and to introduce new categories for submission.

What makes an author eligible for the prize?

Authors with a long-term chronic illness or disability, whether that be in the form of blindness, MS, cystic fibrosis, dwarfism or any other condition that may substantially define their life.

Authors who are not themselves disabled - such as those working as carers - may also be considered for the prize if their work offers a depiction of life with illness. But authors who themselves deal personally and directly with illness or disability will take priority in the judges’ final decisions.

What is important to us is not the particular moral or message in any given work, but a greater visibility for, and a genuine illustration of, life with illness, disease, impairment, or disability.

What is the structure of the prize?

Each year the three judges create a longlist of eight books (decided in December), then shortlist of four (decided in January). The outright winner is announced in February.

The judging panel consists of three judges, each of whom is disabled, chaired by the prize founder Jake Goldsmith - see our Judges page.

I may be disabled, but must I therefore write exclusively about disability?

No. Ill and disabled people are often 'pigeonholed', and if you are a disabled author your work need not be entirely about disability. What we ask for is that disability or illness is at least represented somewhere - even if only implicitly, or as a secondary consideration. If the work contains no reference at all to disability or to long-term illness, then it is unlikely to be what we are looking for. As a hypothetical example, a crime novel in which the protagonist is disabled but in which disability is not the main focus. Disability should at least be represented or present and extant in any work considered.

Are authors with health problems such as mental illness or cancer eligible for the prize? 

This is not a prize simply about ill-health or medicine. It is a prize which celebrates and recognises alternative ways of living and finding meaning.

The Barbellion Prize is intended mostly for people with chronic, life-long conditions – whether congenital, or acquired as adults. It’s never easy to define exactly who’s in, and who’s out, because disability is dynamic and complex. There are already prizes specifically for people with cancer, or people with mental health conditions, and the Barbellion Prize is not intended to duplicate or overlap with those. It is also true that there is far more literature on the subjects of cancer, addiction, depression and mental illness than on other varieties of disability.

The Barbellion Prize is not intended for those with disabilities that do not much affect their participation in society. Many (but not all) of those eligible will live shortened lifespans due to their condition. If you are in any doubt about their eligibility, please contact, in confidence, the prize  administrator. The award decision of the administrator and judges shall be final.

Why was the prize created?

The idea of a book prize for ill and disabled authors came to Jake Goldsmith in the process of writing his memoir, Neither Weak Nor Obtuse. Jake’s memoir is about how his life with cystic fibrosis and continued ill health defines his view of the world, his personality, his philosophy, and his impending death. He reflects on the wider public perception of illness, sickness, and disability, and how disabled people are often discriminated against, overlooked, and misunderstood. He also reflects on the history of literature and writing on illness, and the idea of writing as a method of emotional ventilation: a way to help oneself and others understand or simply contend with these experiences.

Many around the world with long-term illnesses or disabilities do not have a voice that is heard, and indeed may be among those who are the least acknowledged in our communities. It can take a lot of time and energy to be ill, and many do not have the luxury of being able to write about their lives, or be creative, or even have the opportunity of an education in order to do that. And it would surely be better if we could see and celebrate these lives more.

No matter how ubiquitous it is, illness and disability is not given proper attention, or it is shamed and mistreated in everyday life. Disability can become a reality for anyone and yet we will still neglect it, or find room for injustice. And in literature it is still not one of the more essential or primary themes when it deserves to be, given its significance and pervasiveness.

As such, The Barbellion Prize was created to espouse the existence of ill and disabled writers, and to reward authors for their good work and efforts.

A statement from our founder and prize director, Jake Goldsmith:

Illness is ubiquitous, but it is often neglected or it is thoroughly misunderstood. There is a long history of great artists and writers living with illness, including Franz Kafka, Emily Dickinson, John Keats, Katherine Mansfield, Friedrich Nietzsche, Albert Camus, Audre Lorde, and many others.

All of these writers produced estimable work partly because of (and not despite of) their illnesses and the distinctive perspectives illness gave them; implicitly or explicitly.

Their spiritual legacy still exists today, and should be celebrated.

The experiences of those who are ill and disabled still regularly go unnoticed by the wider public, or they remain unsaid. And yet the expression of a phenomenology of illness is capable of being our most laudable and essential literature. It deserves a far greater audience.

"This matter of ill-health is more personal, more essentially of the ego than anything in the world; more than love, for that can be given expression; more than religion, because that is a satisfaction in itself; more than fear, for that passes. Pain is personal, before everything. Only one who has experienced it in some measure can understand its significance in life."

        - Richmond H. Hellyar, in W. N. P. Barbellion (1926).

Virginia Woolf, in her essay On Being Ill, wrote “...it becomes strange indeed that illness has not taken its place with love and battle and jealousy among the prime themes of literature.”

It is indeed strange and insulting that this is still true.

Pain is not always synonymous with disability - obviously. It is varied, individual, complex, reviled, and misunderstood. The point remains that its significance is not always appreciated.

And with The Barbellion Prize we may make some small effort towards a greater appreciation.