Creative Writing

This course will help and encourage you to bring a novel or book of poems as near to publishable quality as possible.

The programme, located in the School of Humanities and Cultural Industries, has become established as one of the leading courses of its kind.

Course Structure and Content

The course is modular and is currently offered for full-time study only.

The MA in Creative Writing is concerned with imaginative writing, which includes novels, short stories, poetry and scriptwriting. The emphasis is upon encouragement, to help you to find and pursue a direction in your writing, and to understand the process of offering a manuscript for publication.

Because of the reputation of the MA in Creative Writing, we are able to recruit excellent students who, every year, form an exciting and mutually supportive community of writers. Frequent visits by other writers, literary agents, publishers, broadcasters and other professionals connected with writing ensure that students are given plentiful advice about how to place work and make decisions about their careers as writers.

The course is not for the writer whose only interest is in their own work, but rather for the writer who can benefit from working closely with fellow students and with tutors, many of whom are practising and published writers.

In recent years, several current or former students have been awarded excellent contracts for novels. Two were long-listed for the Man Booker Prize, three for the Orange Prize, one for the Costa Prize and one for the Guardian First Book Award. One received the Betty Trask Prize; another the Manchester Book Award; another a W.H. Smith New Talent Award. One reached the best-seller lists. Student poets have had their poetry accepted for publication in numerous literary journals, including Ambit, Magma, London Magazine, Poetry Wales, PN Review and The Reader, among others, and have been placed in such competitions as the Bridport, the Frogmore, Mslexia, and Writers Inc. Greene and Heaton Ltd, a leading literary agency, awards an annual prize for the best novel or novel in progress by a student on the course.

It is implicit in the course philosophy that critical reading aids the development of writers. Workshops, in which you look constructively at each other's writing, and context modules, to study the ways in which writers meet certain challenges, are integral parts of the course.

The full MA programme consists of two writing workshops, two context modules and the Manuscript (a double module):

Workshop One

You can either start with a general writing workshop in which you experiment with a range of forms, or a specialist workshop in prose fiction or poetry;

Workshop Two

This is a specialist workshop in prose fiction or poetry.

Teaching Methods and Resources

Students take two three-hour seminars a week for the workshop and context modules. The Manuscript is completed between June and September. Students meet tutors regularly during this period. A residential writing weekend is an essential part of the course.

Assessment Methods

Assessment is by coursework only. Each writing workshop is assessed on the basis of a folder of creative writing and an early draft of part of the Manuscript. Each context module is assessed on the basis of an essay and a folder of creative responses. The Manuscript is 35,000-40,000 words (or the equivalent for poetry and scriptwriting).