Helen Fielding launches Bridget Jones Prize
Howard Lake | 2 November 2026 | News
Helen Fielding, the creator of Bridget Jones, has established a new prize for comic writing from the North of England, to be run by arts charity New Writing North as part of its Northern Writers’ Awards.
The Bridget Jones Prize is open to unpublished and unagented writers who live in the North of England. Entrants must submit a stand-alone piece of first-person prose of up to 1,000 words, in a nod to the diary entries of Fielding’s fictional heroine, which first appeared as a column in The Independent in 1994. The piece can be fiction or life writing.
What the winners receive
The winner will receive a £2,000 bursary and one highly commended writer will receive £1,000. Both will also get an advisory session with an agent from Aitken Alexander Associates, Fielding’s own literary agency, and access to New Writing North’s programme of support for writers. That includes membership of the Society of Authors, networking events, one-to-one support from the charity’s talent development team and advisory sessions with publishing professionals.
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Entries will be judged by Fielding, an agent from Aitken Alexander Associates and a representative of New Writing North.
Quiet comic voices
Fielding, who was born in Yorkshire, said the prize is intended for “the comic voices of people who aren’t famous”, rather than the many well-known Northern comedians. She added that she always tried to make the Bridget columns exactly 1,000 words long, so entries slightly under the limit will not be penalised, but those over it should be avoided. Her columns led to four bestselling novels and four films.
She hopes the prize will honour the Northern comic tone that inspired her own writing, citing Morecambe and Wise, Victoria Wood, Les Dawson, Thora Hird and Alan Bennett.
Will Mackie, Senior Programme Manager (Talent Development) at New Writing North, said this is the first time the Northern Writers’ Awards have featured an award exclusively for comedy writing, and that nobody is better placed than Fielding to spot an original comic voice.
How to enter
The prize is free to enter. Applications open on 23 November 2026 and close at midday on 1 February 2027, and must be made through Submittable. Entries should carry no name on the extract.
Applicants must be over 18, currently unagented, and live full-time in the North of England, defined as the Yorkshire, North East and North West areas covered by Arts Council England. They must also plan to remain there for at least another 12 months. Only debut writers are eligible: those who have not yet published or self-published a full-length work, although short work in magazines and anthologies is allowed.
The winner will be announced at the Northern Writers’ Awards ceremony in Newcastle in summer 2027, with the award presented by Fielding. The prize will run for three years, in 2027, 2028 and 2029.
Arts funding context
New Writing North is a registered charity, and the geographical restriction exists because of conditions attached to its funding from Arts Council England.
The prize shows how a well-known creator can lend a name, a network and an agent’s time to support emerging talent within an established charity’s programme.
New Writing North’s announcement thanks Fielding for her “generous support”, but does not say how the prize money is funded.
Full eligibility criteria and the application form, once live, will be on the New Writing North website.
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About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.