Ubwali Literary Magazine has opened submissions for short stories, essays, visual art (including photography), and poems.
The magazine has outlined submission guidelines covering eligible work, eligibility, word limits, formatting requirements, language, submission rules, response time, publication rights, and payment.
Submission Guidelines
- Work should be free from obvious grammatical errors.
- No revisions are allowed while a submission is under consideration.
- AI-generated work will not be considered.
- Submit only one piece to one category per submission period.
- If a submission is rejected, the same work should not be resubmitted.
- Translations are not accepted.
- Novel excerpts are accepted if they are unpublished, self-contained, and within the word limit.
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted. Contributors whose work is accepted elsewhere should withdraw it by emailing ubwalimagazine@gmail.com with the title and genre of the piece in the subject line.
- Only unpublished work will be considered. Self-publication, including publication on social media, counts as publication.
- Ubwali Literary Magazine requests first serial rights for accepted work. Rights revert to contributors 90 days after publication, and the magazine should be credited as the first publisher if the work is republished elsewhere.
- Co-authored work is not accepted.
- There is no submission fee.
Eligible Work
- Short stories
- Essays
- Visual art (including photography)
- Poems
Eligibility
- Zambian artists living anywhere in the world may submit during all submission periods.
- Non-Zambian African artists living in Africa only may submit in January of every year.
- Submissions received outside these windows will be deleted unread.
Word Limits
- Fiction: 3,000–6,000 words.
- Essays: Up to 3,000 words.
- Poems: One to three poems in a single document.
Formatting Instructions
- Submit work as a Word document (not PDF).
- Use a legible, plain font such as Arial, Book Antiqua, Georgia, Garamond, or Times New Roman.
- Use a 12-point font and 1.5 line spacing.
- Visual art submissions must contain five to ten images in a single document.
- Images must be unpublished in digital or print media, including social media.
- Images must be inclusive, positive, representative, unique, and creative in colour or black and white.
- Image size must be between 5 MB and 10 MB.
Language
- Poetry and prose must be in English but may contain Zambian languages.
- Poems may be written in English and/or in Bemba, Nyanja, Lozi, Tonga, Luvale, Lunda, or Kaonde, or in a combination of English and any Zambian language.
To submit your entry, click here.
Best of luck to all applicants!
