Why Lancaster?
- Study close to the beautiful Lake District, home of the Romantic poets, and inspiration for many writers since
- Take part in small-group workshops to develop your novels, stories, poetry, novels, and scripts
- Explore the professional dimensions of creative writing, such as reading or performing your work, publishing, and marketing
- Get involved with our student-run literary journals
- Be inspired by our rich programme of literary events on campus, online, and in the city’s historic Castle Quarter
Lancaster was one of the very first universities to teach creative writing. Today we continue to lead in the discipline with our celebrated novelists, poets and playwrights.
Focused on your growth
We’ve been helping writers reach their potential since 1970. From day one, our focus has always been helping our students hone their own style and sharpen the skills they need for success.
This emphasis continues today so that the focus in all your modules will, ultimately, be your own writing.
With our wide range of optional modules, you can explore traditional forms such as the short story, the novel, poetry, or theatre, as well as digital media, life-writing, place-writing, and writing for young adults.
Support from experts
You’ll work on a core writing project alongside studying the ethical and professional dimensions of publishing and broadcasting your work. This is supplemented by lectures from visiting speakers, as well as one-on-one tutorials, workshops, and lectures with our esteemed visiting professors, currently Paul Muldoon and Mary Talbot.
In the third term, we assign you a genre-specific expert to help develop your final portfolio. This is intended to be suitable for submission to literary journals or agents, setting you on the road to publication.
Your regular small-group workshops will be supplemented by sessions with all the students on the course.
There is plenty of opportunity to meet your tutors face-to-face to discuss your work, and you’ll find they are friendly, interested and encouraging. You’ll also have an academic advisor who will develop an overview of your progress and offer further support.
Careers
The course provides many opportunities to develop professionally. You can get involved with our student-run magazines, and will also benefit from our rich programme of guest events featuring leading authors, literary agents, and specialists in the publishing industry.
Each year we encourage our students to bring together and edit their own anthology of student work which is then celebrated in a reading event in the summer term. This event is also a chance to meet summer school students from our distance learning Creative Writing MA.
We hope most of our students go on to publish their own work, and many of the Department’s alumni are now celebrated authors. Recent success stories include Andrew McMillan, Nguyen Phan Que Mai, Martha Sprackland, and Daisy Johnson, the youngest-ever author shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize (2018).
You’ll also develop a host of professional skills, such as researching, drafting, editing, listening, persuading and presenting. From advertising to professional services, your skills will be sought after across many different sectors.
Graduates of this course go on to careers in areas such as:
- Publishing
- Journalism
- Writing
- Television and the media
- Teaching
- Librarianship
You may choose to continue your studies at PhD level to deepen your knowledge and progress into an academic career. Graduates of this course have gone on to teach at universities throughout the world.