Creative Writing - 2012 entry

Course content

The MA in Creative Writing involves taking the core compulsory module ‘Creativity, Writing and Textuality: Concepts and Practice’, two elective modules from those available (see module descriptions), and completing a major project of writing in any genre.

For the PGDip, three modules are taken (‘Creativity, Writing and Textuality, Concepts and Practice’ and two electives from those available).

For the PGCert, two modules are taken (‘Creativity, Writing and Textuality, Concepts and Practice’) and one elective from those available.

The MA / PGDip / PGCert in Creative Writing will enable you to:

• develop existing creative writing skills, in a range of genres, towards publishable standard
• undertake a substantial creative writing project
• practise creative writing and reading skills with a range of writing practitioners, including peers and published writers
• acquire a practical understanding of the techniques of writing, editing and working within the parameters of the writing and publishing industry
• engage with theoretical approaches to creativity and creative practice
• demonstrate an appropriate knowledge of literary conventions and historical and contemporary contexts for writing
• explore their own position as writers within specific locales and histories.

We offer the following modules: 

Creativity, Writing and Textuality: Concepts and Practice

This is the core module taken by all students at the beginning of the MA. Through a combination of practical group and individual exercises, discussion sessions and workshops led by our distinguished Creative Writing Fellows, it is designed to develop a grasp of creativity and writing that is critically alert and historically informed, as well as personally enabling and enriching.

Narrative

This module focuses on aspects of narrative, story and plot in both fiction and non-fiction, and encompasses a full range of genres, from the novel and short story to script or screen writing. The beginning of the semester will be tutor-led, with discussion of specific themes, issues and techniques, as well as practise through in-class writing exercises, while the latter part will consist of student-led workshops with the tutor as facilitator.

Shorter Forms

This module is concerned with writing in shorter forms, such as the short story, poetry and the novella. Class sessions will involve both the discussion of assigned reading, by a variety of modern and contemporary authors, and the intensive workshopping of students’ own writing. A series of optional exercises will focus on particular aspects of craft and technique, such as devising effective beginnings and endings, creating evocative settings, introducing characters successfully and revising productively. Students can choose to write in prose, poetry or both.

Poetry

This module combines the writing of poetry with the study of influential poetic movements and writers, both contemporary and historical. Classes will focus on the workshopping of students’ poems and the discussion and analysis of published poems, featuring a wide range of voices and styles. Optional exercises each week will offer fresh, diverse approaches to poetry writing in order to further stimulate students’ creativity.

Writing Lives

This module is concerned with the creative construction of written lives. 'Life' is a complex and ambiguous term, and the module will explore how useful a concept it might be for generating and critiquing the writing of personality, memory, character, narrative personae, individuality and identity. Formally, the module will consider the use of narrative and stylistic options centred on the construction of life, selfhood and identity in both fiction and non-fiction writing. Tutor-led seminars in the first part of the semester will lead to student-led workshops in the second part of the semester.

Writing Voice

This module focuses on voice and style, in both poetry and fiction (short stories and novels). How do authors create or discover their own distinctive writing styles? How do they craft consistent, believable voices for different characters in a work, and modulate tone and register? How do multiple voices (those of author, narrator, and/or individual characters) interact in a text? Through writing exercises, workshopping and discussion, this module will explore such issues and more. Students can choose to write in prose, poetry or both.

Changing Literature

This module explores the ways in which literary texts are constantly transformed through processes of re-reading and re-writing. Re-writing includes such activities as critique, parody, imitation, adaptation and intervention (rewriting a text in an off-centre or challenging way). Re-reading is what happens when a text is read at different times and in different conditions, by the same person or by readers from different cultures and periods. The module will begin by examining how 'classic' plays, poems and novels have been re-read/re-written by others, and how we might re-read/re-write them now. Through experiment and discussion, the module will then turn to re-reading/re-writing texts chosen by the students themselves.

Independent Study

This module offers students the opportunity to design a course of study to suit their own research interests and concerns; organise and carry out a work schedule set by themselves; and to determine a set of learning outcomes and assessment criteria in collaboration with the module leader and a supervisor.

Creativity, Writing and Textuality: Major Project

This module enables students to complete an extended piece of their own creative writing in any genre or genres, accompanied by a self-reflective critical commentary; the ‘major project’ and critical commentary together form the equivalent of a master’s-level dissertation. The development and writing of these elements will be conducted through one-to-one tutorials with members of staff and through group workshops, some of which will be led by our Creative Writing Fellows, who will also offer feedback on individual students’ work.

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Department

Department of English and Modern Languages

Course length

Full-time: PGCert: 4 months, PGDip: 8 months, MA: 12 months
Part-time: PGCert: 2 semesters, PGDip: 3 semesters, MA: 24 months

Teaching location

Headington Campus, Gipsy Lane

Start date

September 2012

UKPASS code

P038304

Entry requirements

Applicants should normally hold a good honours degree (2.1 or above), or its equivalent, in an appropriate discipline and must be able to demonstrate ability in creative writing. A portfolio of recent creative work must be submitted (max 25 pages, please be selective in your choice of pieces to include in the portfolio) and applicants may be interviewed. If it is some time since you completed your undergraduate education and you do not meet the standard requirement, it may be possible to consider your application based on evidence of other relevant personal and professional experience, the support of your referees and the portfolio of written work.

Scholarships and funding

For general sources of financial support, see:

• funding for students from the UK and EU
• funding for students from outside the EU

Why Oxford is a great place to study Creative Writing

Oxford is the quintessential literary city, mythologised over centuries of writing from Thomas Hardy to Philip Pullman (who is a Creative Writing Fellow on the MA). 

It makes an the ideal city in which to study Creative Writing with its vibrant literary community, its many resident literary figures and the publishing companies such as Oxford University Press, Blackwell Publishing, Taylor & Francis and Harcourt Education which are based here. Cultural and literary events such as the Oxford Literary Festival take place throughout the year and Oxford also has world-class libraries such as the Bodleian, and archives, collections and museums, including the Ashmolean, Pitt Rivers Museum and Modern Art Oxford.

Support for students studying Creative Writing

Throughout your time at Oxford Brookes you will receive outstanding support from our faculty staff, both academically and personally. Our student support coordinators are there to support you in all aspects of your academic career, from module choices to any personal issues you may experience. Your academic adviser will be allocated when you start, and will provide academic and departmental support for you throughout your studies. We have a dedicated English and Creative Writing librarian who will help you access relevant materials and guide you through the huge range of information available. The university library boasts an impressive range of materials including ejournals, ebooks and databases.

How Brookes supports postgraduate students

Supporting your learning

From academic advisers and support co-ordinators to specialist subject librarians and other learning support staff, we want to ensure that you get the best out of your studies.

Personal support services

We want your time at Brookes to be as enjoyable and successful as possible. That's why we provide all the facilities you need to be relaxed, happy and healthy throughout your studies.

Departmental research highlights

Commitment to research-led teaching means that all our teaching staff are recognised experts in their field. Research underpins our teaching and learning so that, throughout your course, you will be introduced to the the very latest academic thinking. Our teaching staff contribute to the canon of published work in their specialist fields influencing debate and discussion, and value the opportunity to share their ideas with students through their teaching.

Some recent research highlights include:

• Dr Eric White has been awarded a Vacation Visiting Fellowship at the Rothermere American Institute in the University of Oxford.  The focus of his research programme at the RAI will be The Transatlantic Avant-Garde: Little Magazines and Localist Modernism, 1912-1932 which will culminate in the production of his first monograph. Eric will also be focusing on ways to develop American and transatlantic modernist studies across institutions in Oxford.
• Tom Betteridge, Professor of Early Modern English Literature and Drama, in September 2010 was awarded an Engaging Science Grant from the Wellcome Trust to support an exciting new project entitled 'Victorian Medicine in 1850 and 2012'.
• In 2010 a unique online edition of the collected plays of dramatist, Richard Brome, was launched. It marked the culmination of a four-year project in which Oxford Brookes’ Lecturer in Drama, Dr Eleanor Lowe, collaborated with researchers at Royal Holloway, University of London and the University of Sheffield. The aim behind the project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, was to provide wide-spread access to Brome’s work for scholars, theatre practitioners, and the public.

Research excellence

In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, 95% of academic research produced by the English Department was 'internationally recognised', 40% of which was regarded as 'internationally excellent' or 'world leading' (the top grade). The department has particular strengths in 20th-century poetry; modern fiction studies; gender studies; travel writing; Renaissance writing, including drama and performance history; 19th-century fiction; 20th-century Irish and American writing; textual intervention and change; and post-colonial writing.

Research areas and clusters

Research supervision is offered in the following areas:

• English 20th-century poetry – particularly Eliot and Heaney
• Irish writing
• Modernist drama
• Witchcraft in the 19th century
• John Clare and eco-criticism
• Sir Walter Scott
• Ben Jonson
• Shakespeare
• Theatre and science
• Utopia
• Contemporary literature
• Thomas More
• Modernist poetry
• Stylistics
• Creativity
• Franz Kafka
• Victorian religion
• Literature and war