Welcome!
Congratulations on your acceptance into the prestigious ranks of the Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award Selection Committee!
We have prepared the following guidelines to aid you in your selection of a Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award shortlist. Please read them closely and follow them throughout your selection process.
Residency Requirement
We believe that, as New York City is the world capital of the literary arts community, a strong Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award shortlist should contain 50 – 60% writers affiliated with New York City. This affiliation can come through birthplace, college attendance, or current residence. For the purposes of the Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award, New York City will be defined as Brooklyn and Manhattan.
Diversity Guidelines
The shortlist must contain a literary artist who comes from one of the following communities:
– African-American
– Other “Writers of Color”
– Blue-collar
– Foreign-born
– Southern
– LGBTQ
– Female
The Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Foundation is strongly committed to promoting diversity in the literary arts, and our Diversity Guidelines help ensure that we continue to advance this cause; we regret that the Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award Selection Committee will be unable to consider more than one writer who meets a Diversity requirement, with the exception of white female authors, who may comprise 25 – 35% of the shortlist (space permitting). Please make your selections accordingly.
Illicit content
Graphic depictions of sexual content are permissible so long as the sex is joyless, deviant, or between an older male literature/creative writing professor and a young female student. (The latter is strongly encouraged.)
Preferred themes
Preference should be given to stories that contain the following themes (as many as possible):
– Alienation
– Writers struggling to write
– The dysfunctional relationships and thwarted hopes of 20-somethings
– The dysfunctional relationships and bitter regrets of 40-somethings
– Dinner parties
Genre fiction
Genre fiction is not appropriate for the Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award. We are aware that it is increasingly difficult to distinguish well-written genre fiction from literary fiction, so we have prepared the following spotter’s guide. Be on the lookout for stories that may contain:
– Quests by which a boy becomes a man
– Corpses found in windowless rooms locked from the inside
– Dragons and/or spaceships and/or zombies and/or vampires (Werewolves okay as long as clearly metaphorical)
– Romance plots that are happily resolved
– Nerds
If you are considering nominating a story that contains genre elements, check to see if the author has been compared by critics to Michael Chabon and/or Jonathan Lethem. If so, this is probably a safe candidate. If not, you may have mistakenly admired genre fiction. Please disregard all such stories.
In Conclusion
We know that you are all suitably conscious of the honor that comes with being a Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award Selection Committee Member, or you would not have been chosen by the Fotherington-Vanderbilt Weiss Literary Arts Award Selection Committee Member Selection Committee. However modest it may be, we look forward to your individual contribution to our collective legacy.
