Welcome - Please Scroll Down for an Overview of the ESSC

Welcome to the British Council / Zayed University Extremely Short Story Competition [ESSC] Arabian Peninsula. The ESSC is a 50word short story competition which invites students at secondary schools and tertiary colleges and universities for local/national students to submit stories to the http://50words.org website to win exciting prizes; get published and contribute to education and research.

The ESSC originated in 2003 in the United Arab Emirates [UAE] where it was developed by Peter Hassall at Zayed University [ZU]. It was originally designed as an email competition for the ZU Literature Club which was held between the two campuses of Zayed University: one campus in Dubai and the other campus in Abu Dhabi. Then, as now, students were invited to write stories which could be fact or fiction; poetry or prose but which had to be exactly 50 words in length. At that time, Zayed University had only female Emirati students. A book authored entirely by female Moslem Emirati students entitled “Emiratia: Voices of Zayed University” was published ‘in-house’ by Zayed University.

In 2005, a new edition of this ESSC anthology was reprinted and given a new title "Emiratia: World English voices of Emirati Women", a stunning new cover, an additional introduction in Arabic and an ISBN number. The allocation of an ISBN number for “Emiratia” enabled this ESSC anthology to be sold in shops and appear on the shelves of libraries in the UAE and abroad. This ESSC anthology is now available as far away as the Charles Young Research Library, University of California Los Angeles [UCLA] California, USA. It is available for purchase in the Middle East at Magrudy’s Bookstores price AED 30 or US $10; to order extra copies click here

"Emiratia: World English voices of Emirati Women is available at Magrudy’s and Jashanmal’s Bookstores in the Middle East at AED 30 or US $10 and contains 250 ESSC stories written by 150 female students from Zayed University in Abu Dhabi and Dubai. To order extra copies click here.

Since then, the ESSC has been held on two further occasions throughout the UAE, with the Women’s and Men’s Colleges at the Higher Colleges of Technology and UAE University participating in the ESSC 2006 and ESSC 2007. These have resulted in two further ESSC anthologies. The first of these is entitled: “Pearls of Emirati Wisdom: World English Voices of the UAE” and the second (forthcoming ESSC anthology) is to be called: “Facets of Emirati Women: World English Voices of the UAE”.

“Pearls of Emirati Wisdom: World English Voices of the UAE” is available at Magrudy’s and Jashanmal’s Bookstores in the Middle East at AED 30 or US $10 and contains 1000 ESSC stories written by 500 male and female students at tertiary institutions throughout the UAE. To order extra copies click here.

The forthcoming: “Facets of Emirati Women: World English Voices of the UAE” is, for the first time, based around a theme that of ‘Emirati women’. This will also be the first ESSC anthology to be richly illustrated with photographs taken of Emirati women by Emirati students. 
“Facets of Emirati Women” will be available at Magrudy’s and Jashanmal’s Bookstores in the Middle East at AED 30 or US $10 and will contain 500 ESSC stories written by male and female students at tertiary institutions throughout the UAE and 100 photographs of Emirati women taken by Emirati women themselves! For advance orders and to order extra copies click here.

For almost 3 years ESSC 3 stories have appeared on the Leisure Pages of the City Times supplement of the national UAE newspaper Khaleej Times as shown here.

Coverage of the ESSC Awards Evening at the impressive new campus of Zayed University Dubai showing some of the ESSC Prizewinners with the Guest of Honour His Excellency Mohammad Al Murr Chairman of the Dubai Cultural Council and himself the author of the short story anthologies ‘Wink of the Mona Lisa’ and ‘Dubai Tales’ (Motivate) in the City Times Pages of Khaleej Times Wednesday 20th June 2007. Appearing alongside H. E. Mohammad Al Murr are Dr. Salah Al Qassim Secretary General of the Dubai Cultural Council with Dr. Lois Muir Provost of Zayed University and Peter Hassall, originator of the ESSC. Jon Hassall and Katy Hassall are also shown providing the music for the ESSC Awards Evening.

In 2005 Peter Hassall, the ‘ESSC Deviser’ and ‘Principal Editor’, was invited to talk about the ESSC UAE as a featured speaker at the international Asia TEFL Conference in Korea. This visit resulted in Kevin Mclaven of the British Council running a further ESSC at the British Council in Seoul. Further presentations by  Peter Hassall at Asia TEFL in Beijing and at the International Association for World Englishes [IAWE] Conference at Chukyo University, Nagoya led to the ESSC being adopted by the Professor Noboyuki Honna, President of the Japanese Association For Asian Englishes [JAFAE]. Under the leadership of Professor Honna, the ESSC Japan has to date been administered by JAFAE twice at universities and high schools in Japan. The 2nd ESSC 2007 Japan also allowed Chinese students to enter the competition.

In Japan the first Zayed University ESSC anthology  “Emiratia: World English voices of Emirati Women”, is now available for purchase by ‘publication on-demand’. This method of publication allows “Emiratia” to be ordered on the internet and for purchasers to decide when they wish their copy to be delivered by courier direct to their homes. This means that if you want to read 50 word stories written by Zayed University, you could travel East and buy a copy of “Emiratia” in Japan.
You can see some examples of ESSC stories written by Japanese students in Japan at these 2 websites:

For the ESSC 2006 Japan go to: http://essc.fit.ac.jp/en/award_work.html

For the ESSC 2007 Japan go to: http://www.jafae.org/essc/2007_2nd/en/

Hopefully, one day we will be able to buy a copy of the ESSC stories written by Japanese students in Japan. In the UAE, Peter & Jon Hassall have edited a book of Japanese ESSC stories written by Japanese students. This ESSC anthology “Rays of the Rising Sun: World English Voices of Japan” (see below) is NOW READY to be published in the Middle East, we are now just waiting to see if there is sufficient interest in reading ESSC stories written in Japan. The price will be AED 30, US $10 or Yen 1000.Please contact us stating how many copies you would like to buy when available.

We hope that you enjoy entering the BC ZU ESSC 2008 Arabian Peninsula and that your teachers enjoy helping you. We are looking forward to reading overall winners of the competition in the ESSC anthology for the Arabian Peninsula and country anthologies entitled 
“Our Memories, Dreams & Futures” in the World English Voices Series for your country: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Yemen.

Good luck and enjoy reading and writing English the Arabian Way!