The clock is ticking toward the last chance for writers to prove their mettle at the 2011 Utah Arts Festival.---

The Community Writing Center (Library Square, 210 E. 400 South, Suite 8, 801-957-2192, SLCC.edu/CWC) hosts the Wasatch Iron Pen Literary Marathon this weekend for writers of all levels. Registered participants will have 24 hours to turn out an original conglomeration of words that would hopefully make Hemingway smile, or cause Pulitzer to bestow them with awards.

The deadline for registration is 5:55 p.m., Friday, June 24 and it can be done online, in person or by calling the center. The fee is $10 per genre—fiction, nonfiction or poetry—or $30 for the Ultra Marathon, which includes all three.

Writers will be given a visual prompt at 6 p.m. Friday, either online or at the center, and then set forth with a flurry of keyboard taps to burn the midnight oil until the Saturday deadline. Then the judges persevere late into Saturday evening, judging the works without any knowledge of the author. A winner and an honorable mention will be awarded for each category—youth and adult judged separately—and the winners are encouraged to read their works at the festival’s Big Mouth Stage on Sunday starting at 2 p.m.

So, do you have what it takes to hold the Iron Pen? For more information, registration and a list of other activities throughout the weekend, visit the center’s Website.

And, for the sake of full disclosure, I will be entering into the nonfiction category, and will be reporting on my experience next Monday.