CAGIBI accepts and reads submissions year round through our submissions manager, provided by Submittable. This is for our online and print journal issues, and also for the Macaron Prize when those respective reading periods are open. There you will see guidelines specific to each category. Other general guidelines and answers to common questions are provided here, such as the policy for simultaneous submissions (please do!), how to withdraw, and rights and payment.

We encourage writers to submit their work to multiple journals (referred to as “simultaneous submissions”). If your work is accepted elsewhere (awesome!), please withdraw your CAGIBI submission from within Submittable. Do not email the editors to withdraw part or all of your submission; instead, withdraw in Submittable. For partial withdrawals, such as for one of multiple poems, add a message to your submission. To add a message, log in to Submittable, click on your submission, and you will see there a box to leave us a message. For more detailed instruction on how to do that within Submittable, scroll down to the bottom of this page.

CAGIBI does not consider work which has previously appeared in print or online.

When you can expect to hear back: Because CAGIBI is open year-round for submissions, our editors are reading nonstop. Every submission is read by our editors and carefully considered. Though we aim for sooner, a decision should be made within six to eight months.  If you haven’t heard within eight months, it simply means that your submission is still under consideration. For the amount of submissions we receive, we are a small team of editors. We thank you for your patience.

You can sign up for our newsletter without submitting. When you submit to CAGIBI, you’re also signing up for our newsletter. We will never give out your e-mail to anyone else.

SUBMIT

Print Issues & the Omnibus! Anthology

Works published in Cagibi’s online issues are eligible for publication in an annual print anthology. (This has been put on hold since the pandemic.) Each year, a guest editor curates the anthology. Jonathan Galassi was the inaugural 2019 Omnibus! Anthology guest editor, selecting works from the previous year’s issues. (Read his Cagibi interview: “Jonathan Galassi // The Cagibi Express Interview.”) For 2019 and 2020, the anthology and Macaron Prize winners appeared together in a special print issue. Contributors whose works are selected for reprinting in the anthology will receive one complimentary copy as compensation.

Works in Translation

The editors welcome English translations from any language of both prose and poetry. Before submitting translations of works that are not in the public domain, translators should identify the rights holder and obtain a statement that the rights to publish an English translation are available. Include the original text if possible, as well as a short biography of the writer, a short biography of the translator, and a statement or concise paragraph introducing the work. If there are extenuating circumstances that prevent you from including a copy of the original text at the time of your submission, please note that in the cover letter.

Macaron Prize

This is CAGIBI’s annual prize in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. (This has been put on hold since the pandemic.) Winners and finalists are published in a Macaron Prize special print issue, and the issue is celebrated at an event in New York City. See the Macaron Prize page for open submission periods. When the submission period is open, an entry fee is required for one of:

Fiction: One story, 4000 words maximum.

Poetry: Up to three poems. Place your poems in one document.

Nonfiction: One personal narrative non-fiction essay, 4000 words maximum

One of the above, per entry. Multiple entries are accepted, and incur the submission fee per entry.

All entries must be sent through the Submittable interface. All entries will also be considered for publication in Cagibi’s quarterly online issues.

Macaron Prize Eligibility:

Those currently or recently affiliated with the judges should refrain from entering the contests. Close friends and relatives of the judge, and students who have studied with the judge within the last two years, should refrain from entering the contests.

Only previously unpublished work is eligible for consideration. Simultaneous submissions are accepted as long as you immediately withdraw your submission within Submittable should your piece be accepted elsewhere.

Works translated from other languages are not eligible unless you wrote both the original and the translation. Open to writers, worldwide; works must be written in English.

Cagibi reserves the right to not declare a winner; in this rare case, no entry fees will be refunded.

Cagibi supports the CLMP Code of Ethics for literary contests.