Celeste Lipkes, MD, MFA, a fourth-year resident in the Yale Department of Psychiatry, continues to earn recognition for Radium Girl, her manuscript of poems.
Lipkes was recently named a finalist in the 2020-21 Jake Adam York Prize for a first or second poetry collection. The book prize drew 870 manuscripts this year, and 18 were judged finalists.
The prize is sponsored by Copper Nickel, a national literary journal housed at the University of Colorado Denver, and Milkweed Editions, a nonprofit publisher of literature for adults and young adults.
Lipkes’ writing in Radium Girl combines personal experiences and her training in medicine with the history of various magic tricks. The title Radium Girl comes from a magic trick by the same name, in which a woman is locked in a tall, thin box and somehow emerges unharmed after steel rods and swords are plunged through holes in the box.
Radium Girl was judged a semi-finalist for the 2019 Berkshire Prize, a national poetry contest sponsored by Tupelo Press. It has been recognized in other contests, including as a finalist for the 2019 University of Wisconsin Brittingham and Felix Pollak Prize and a semi-finalist for the 2018 A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize.
Lipkes began writing poetry long before she arrived at Yale for residency, and her work has appeared in many publications.