It sounds like some sort of awesome comic book team-up: Jonathan Cape, which is a publishing division of still-a-powerhouse Random House, the Comica Festival and England’s Observer newspaper (the sister paper to the Guardian) have joined forces to launch The Observer/Jonathan Cape/Comica Graphic Short Story Competition.

If you’ve dreamed of being published, if you’re already published but want a wider audience, or if you’ve just got something to say in comic strip form, this is your chance. They’re looking for an original 4-page comic strip that’s not been published anywhere before. Personal, introspective altcomics will probably do better here than your super-hero extravaganza, but that’s up to you to decide.

Alas, this British comics contest is not open to any former British colonies, just residents of Great Britain and Ireland, but still, this is a big chance for someone to score. The winning entry will receive £1,000 (which is around $1500US) and be published in the Observer Review, which is not a bad audience to tap into. Careers have been built on far less.

And who will pick the winners? The judges are: Audrey Niffenegger (artist and best selling author); David Hughes (author of Walking the Dog); Rachel Cooke (The Observer); Dan Franklin (Publisher, Jonathan Cape); Paul Gravett (Director, Comica Festival); Suzanne Dean (Random House Creative Director). That’s a pretty hefty list of smarties, and Gravett certainly knows his comics. He was the founder of Escape, one of the great magazines about comics.

And if you’re worried about signing away your rights, well, this is how you run a contest: “Entrants will own and retain any copyright in their entries.” Sweet.

The application form, last year’s winner, and the Observer layout are all available at the link. Deadline is coming up in October, so don’t wait ‘til the last minute.

Good luck, entrants!

[Artwork: Cover to Great British Comics by Paul Gravett and Peter Stanbury]