Creative Writing and English Literature BA (Hons)

In Year 1, you begin your journey to learn the art of reading as a writer. You will explore methodologies, literary criticism and theories across historical and contemporary fiction. You will create poetry and short fiction adding layers of meaning using your new skills. This packed year also sees you grapple with a radio play and the basics of scriptwriting to open new horizons.

In Year 2 the emphasis is on developing a professional approach to your writing. Write contemporary poetry, short fiction and a one-act play, then analyse and edit your work to make it better. The English literature syllabus becomes more flexible. Choose from modules centred around staff interests and research specialisms. Explore Renaissance drama, Romanticism, Restoration-era poetry and prose, or children’s literature.

Creative writing allows you to hone your craft in Year 3. You’ll have opportunities to specialise in your area of interest, with optional modules throughout offering the chance to experiment with your work. For example, you could look at screenwriting, experimental writing or or work towards post-graduate study with our Writer at Work module. Or fine-tune the skills learned in Year 1 and 2 further by exploring poetry and fiction. In English Literature, further optional modules enable you to delve into Victorian literature, the Modernist movement and contemporary authors.

How you'll study

Class teaching and learning for Creative Writing modules is centred on the writer’s workshop, where there is a strong emphasis on participation and the creative community.

You will learn the habits of a professional writer, including keeping a writer’s journal, and engage in research and observation, re-drafting and editing, and presenting work to a high standard. Self and peer appraisal are important, as are paired and small group work. All modules are underpinned by a sense of an audience – ranging from a student’s seminar group through electronic and paper publication to performance.

Teaching and learning for English Literature modules includes lectures and seminars, workshops, group activities, independent research and our online Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). As well as module and seminar tutors, personal tutors and year tutors will support you through your studies.

The University hosts the annual Edge Hill Short Story Prize and has recently set up the Edge Hill University Press, which offers students the opportunity of internships working on the editorial team.

How you'll be assessed

Creative Writing modules are assessed by coursework, which includes creative practice, critical practice, essays and reflection on the whole process.

Assessment of English Literature modules involves a mixture of coursework and examinations with emphasis placed on work produced in your own time or formally presented in class. Typically, you can expect to be assessed on essays, short analyses, reports and close readings, oral presentations and group work.

Who will be teaching you

You’ll be taught by tutors who are practising, professional writers. They include widely produced and published short-story writers, poets, dramatists and games writers. The programme team are also practising researchers and scholars, publishing work in a variety of academic and literary journals. This means that you will be taught by people who know how to succeed in the creative industries as well as academia.

There is also a dedicated and approachable team of English Literature tutors who are active in research in all taught subject areas, publishing books and articles on a regular basis. Several have been successful in winning national research awards from bodies such as the British Academy, the Arts and Humanities Research Council and The Leverhulme Trust.

As a Creative Writing student at Edge Hill University, you will have the opportunity to attend workshops and readings with a variety of guest writers at the Arts Centre. Close links have also been established with Liverpool’s Everyman Theatre as well as other poetry venues across Merseyside.