“The Hubert Butler Essay Prize is a splendid thing, both a tribute to one of the very greatest exponents of the form, and a venture aimed at ensuring the continued health and vivacity of the form itself. Montaigne would approve, and so would Orwell. Write on!” John Banville, Honorary Patron
HUBERT BUTLER ESSAY PRIZE 2026
The title of this year’s essay is:
“Poetry makes nothing happen” (W.H.Auden). What impact can high culture make in the real world?
The quotation in the essay title is taken from Auden’s elegy for Yeats, written in 1939, just before the outbreak of the Second World War. In times of global conflict, there can be an acute awareness of the impotence of art. What impact, if any, can high culture have in a world threatened by disaster?
How to Enter
The Hubert Butler Essay Prize is intended to encourage the art of essay-writing with a European dimension and to expand interest in Butler's work. There is a prize sponsored by Haus Publishing of €2,500.
Deadline: 3 July 2026
Criteria for entry:
The author must be over 18, and be a UK or European Union citizen.
Conditions of entry
Essays submitted should be in English and of no more than 3,000 words in length (inclusive of quotations).
Entries should be double-spaced, and saved as either a .pdf or .rtf file.
The author's name should not be on the essay, as these are judged blind, so should be on the title/cover page only.
The judges' decision is final. The judges reserve the right not to award the prize, should no entry reach a sufficiently high standard.
Please include the following details in your email:
Name
Postal address
E-Mail
Telephone number
Where you heard about the prize
SEND TO:
contact (at) heartlondon dot org