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• Postgraduate taught courses

English Literature (Creative Writing)

Explore this course:.

Applications for 2024 entry are now open. Apply now or register your interest to hear about postgraduate study and events at the University of Sheffield.

School of English, Faculty of Arts and Humanities

Course description

You’ll study contemporary creative writing methods and practices and develop your skills in different genres, cross-genres and a wide range of formal and genre experimentations. You’ll also develop and explore your own creative and critical writing through practical workshops and the critical reading of contemporary creative and theoretical texts.

You’ll be encouraged to take all four creative writing core modules, with a minimum of three, which are designed to interact with each other theoretically, thematically and methodologically, to allow for experimentation between literary practices and productive genre crossovers.

The course culminates in a dissertation. You’ll be producing portfolios of both creative and critical work for each module and for your dissertation, all of which may take the form of poetry, prose poetry, short stories, a novel extract, poetic prose, hybrid texts and other genres, as well as formal or cross-media experimentations.

This MA will help you develop your creative writing to a publishable quality, providing a positive, friendly, nurturing, intellectual and creative environment for confident, bold and imaginative development of contemporary creative writing forms and practices. You’ll explore your own writing through practical workshops and learn how to creatively and constructively critique your own and other students' work.

You’ll benefit from the buzzing literary culture at Sheffield and get involved in public and university readings, publications and festivals throughout your time with us. You're encouraged to publish your work and to participate in student-led, peer-feedback editorial sessions.

We run monthly public readings within the Centre for Poetry and Poetics with established writers and have an annually published creative writing journal, Route 57 , which is edited and assembled by our own creative writing students. Each year we also run various creative writing projects, student readings and hubs which will give you a variety of opportunities to meet fellow writers within our well established Postgraduate Creative Writing community which comprises current and alumni students of the MA and PhD.

An open day gives you the best opportunity to hear first-hand from our current students and staff about our courses.

You may also be able to pre-book a department visit as part of a campus tour. Open days and campus tours

• 1 year full-time
• 2 years part-time

How we teach core modules

For the four core creative writing modules, you’ll meet for a two-hour workshop each week. These workshops are held in the late afternoons or early evenings.

A workshop is an informal, creative and critical environment that allows you to receive feedback on your writing from both the tutor and your fellow students. 

You’ll have the opportunity to discuss creative and theoretical practices, drawing on a wide range of selected contemporary reading material. You'll be encouraged to produce new writing on a weekly basis, which we discuss in the workshops.

How we teach optional modules

Modules from MA English Literature are taught in seminars, which can vary from 1.5 to 2.5 hours long. These are held weekly or fortnightly depending on the module. Many of these seminars are held during the day.

Teaching staff

Our current staff are active and internationally-recognised authors, academics and creative forces in their fields:

• Dr Agnes Lehoczky (Programme Convenor for the MA in Creative Writing, Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing)
• Professor Adam Piette (Professor of Modern Literature)
• Clare Fisher (Lecturer in Creative Writing)
• Dr Michael Kindellan (Vice Chancellor’s Fellow)
• Jane Lowe (Creative Writing Programme Administrator)

Former teaching staff have included Dr Vahni Capildeo, Professor Simon Armitage, Dr Honor Gavin, Professor Denise Riley, Dr Laura Joyce and Dr Rachel Genn.

You'll be assessed at the end of each term on creative writing portfolios which will include your creative work and a critical essay as well as your dissertation project which will consist of both creative and critical components.

The dissertation is 80% creative and 20% critical reflection on your own work, genre or relevant literary tradition. You'll prepare for it through work you've done in both creative writing modules. The word count for fiction is:

• 12,000 words of creative work
• 4,000 words of which may already have been workshopped or submitted
• 3,000-5,000 word critical essay

For poetry, the word count is:

• 20 poems, or equivalent (roughly up to 400 lines approx), five of which may have already been previously workshopped or submitted (as long as drafts are submitted to indicate changes)
• 3,000-5,000 words critical essay

Mixed portfolios are welcome. For work previously submitted, we would like you to submit drafts to show changes and developments made to the material.

Your career

Our alumni have gone on to publish creative work and pursue research paths in various sectors. View a list of publications by our current students and alumni who have published work during and since completing our degree programme in Creative Writing.

Alumni and student publications

Your career - the School of English

School of English

We're a research-intensive school with an international perspective on English studies. Students can specialise in their chosen subject, while taking modules from other programmes, forging interdisciplinary connections. We encourage you to get involved and to apply your academic learning, working in partnership with external organisations both within the city of Sheffield and beyond.

Our staff are researchers, critics, and writers. They're also passionate, dedicated teachers who work tirelessly to ensure their students are inspired.

We keep seminar groups small because we believe that's the best way to stimulate discussion and debate. Our modules use a range of innovative assessments and can include designing websites, writing blog posts, and working with publishing software, in addition to writing essays and delivering presentations.

We're committed to providing you with the pastoral support you need in order to thrive on your degree. You'll be assigned a personal tutor with whom you'll have regular meetings. You're welcome to see any of our academic staff in their regular student consultations if there's anything you want to ask.

Entry requirements

Minimum 2:1 undergraduate honours degree in English literature, language, linguistics or a related subject (eg history, philosophy, modern languages).

A portfolio submission of 2,000 words of prose/drama or five poems (or equivalent, roughly 100 lines), to be sent along with the application form.

If you're an international student who does not meet the entry requirements for this course, you have the opportunity to apply for a pre-masters programme in Business, Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Sheffield International College . This course is designed to develop your English language and academic skills. Upon successful completion, you can progress to degree level study at the University of Sheffield.

If you have any questions about entry requirements, please contact the department .

Fees and funding

There are a number of studentships and fee bursaries available, funded by the University. Deadlines for funding applications are usually in winter/early spring.

You can apply now using our Postgraduate Online Application Form. It's a quick and easy process.

More information

[email protected] +44 114 222 0220

More From Forbes

A writing room: the new marketplace of writer classes, retreats, and collectives.

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A Writing Room is one of the fast-growing writer collectives. The four co-founders (left to right): ... [+] Reese Zecchin, Director of Production; Jacob Nordby, Director of Writer Development; A. Ashe, Creative Director; Claire Giovino, Community Director.

The past decade has brought an explosion in the number of books published each year in the United States (an estimated three to four million annually). In turn, this explosion is bringing a growing and evolving marketplace of writer classes, retreats and collectives. It is a marketplace creating new jobs and entrepreneurship opportunities—both for mainstream tech, marketing and managerial workers, as well as for writer/artist denizens of America’s bohemia.

The Drivers of Growth in Book Publishing

The number of book sales in the United States remains healthy, though it has leveled off in the past four years. In 2020, 756.82 million book unit sales were made in the US alone. This number climbed to 837.66 million in 2021, before falling slightly to 787.65 million units in 2022 and 767.36 million units in 2023.

What has changed dramatically has been the number of books published. Steve Piersanti of Berrett-Koehler Publishers estimates that three million books were published in the US, up 10 times from the number only 16 years ago . Other estimates put the number of published books annually at closer to four million .

The main driver of this growth in books published has been self-publishing. According to Bowker , which provides tools for self-publishing, an estimated 2.3 million books were self-published in 2021. Up through the 1990s (now the distant past in publishing), writers of all types of books, fiction and nonfiction, were dependent on convincing publishing houses to publish their work. As the technology for self-publishing and print on demand grew in the early 2000s, writers could publish on their own, and a very large number of Americans began to do so.

Fueling growth also is the level of affluence and discretionary income that an increasing segment of American society is reaching. For centuries, theorists across the political spectrum have envisioned a society, freed from basic economic needs, pursuing creative activities, with writing as a primary activity. In The German Ideology , Karl Marx could write about the economy of abundance in which individuals pursue writing as one of a series of daily activities—hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, write criticism in the evening. John Maynard Keynes in a 1930 essay, “ Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren” , envisions a time a hundred years forward (2030) in which writing is no longer the province of the upper classes. Contemporary theorists on the future of work, such as John Tamny, similarly see a blooming of creative and artistic activities by the average citizen.

Best High-Yield Savings Accounts Of 2024

Best 5% interest savings accounts of 2024, a writing room, and the emerging marketplace of writer training.

A marketplace of writing coaches, classes and retreats expanded throughout the late twentieth century and first years of the twentieth century. Published authors and even recently-minted graduates of MFA programs hung out shingles for individual coaching and small classes. Colleges expanded their writing programs and certifications, and writer retreats multiplied. Co-working and literary event spaces were established in major cities ( The Writers Room in New York, The Writers Grotto in San Francisco). But the marketplace continued to bump up against geographic and logistical limitations.

Then, along the came the internet, and its evolution.

Today, hundreds of businesses throughout the country offer assistance to aspiring writers. Many continue to offer some in-person assistance through coaching, classes or retreats. But as in other fields, the internet has allowed for a nationwide (worldwide) reach that these businesses are taking advantage of to scale. The major pre-internet writer assistance companies, such as The Writers Studio , added online courses and instruction, and the early internet-based companies from the 1990s, such as Writers.com (a pioneer in the internet field), steadily expanded their offerings. New enterprises are springing up on a regular basis, including the writer collectives.

A Writing Room is one of the fastest growing of the writer collectives, and its suite of services illustrate the how the field is evolving.

A Writing Room has its roots in the writing classes that novelist Anne Lamott had been teaching for some years, and her interest by the early 2020s in creating a larger on-going community of writers. Lamott connected with a team of four entrepreneurs who had experience with previous start-ups and expertise in online tools. In early 2023 they set out to develop A Writing Room.

Novelist Anne Lamott, one of the partners in A Writing Room.

A Writing Room launched in June 2023, and followed a few months later with an inaugural writers retreat in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Though hastily arranged, the retreat attracted more than 400 in person attendees and over 1600 attendees online. In the first half of 2024, the company set up a membership structure of monthly and annual memberships. Within months, over 550 writers had joined.

The products that members can access are aimed in part at teaching the craft of writing. In a recent author discussion (with close to 400 participants joining online) Lamott discussed the craft of writing with novelist Donna Levin . Both started publishing in the 1980s. They noted how much publishing and the role of the writer have changed, but emphasized the fundamentals that have remained over their forty years, related to craft and the responsibility of the writer: the daily commitment, the careful development of plot and characters, the numerous rewrites (as many as you think you need, and one more).

A Writing Room offers a series of on-demand courses, online discussions with authors and publishing professionals, and daily writing prompts, built around writing as craft. It further offers instruction on the paths to and options for publication, building a following of readers.

At its center, A Writing Room is about being part of a community of writers, giving and receiving regular feedback from other members, as well as feedback from writing mentors and coaches. In an interview earlier this year, Lamott explained:

The great myth about writing is that it's an entirely solitary activity. This really isn't true. Every book I've ever written has been with a lot of help from my community. I wouldn't be the writer I am today — and wouldn't even want to write — without people to share the process and finished work. Writing is a process, but it doesn't have to (and really shouldn't be) done in total isolation.

The writing process can feel overwhelming. It often does for me. Believe me, a trusted writing friend is a secret to life.

Other emerging writing collectives also emphasize community and cooperation. Levin underscored this point in the recent online discussion: “Writing can be such an isolated activity, and to some extent needs to be. You want to seek out a community that can give you the support you need and also the honest feedback.”

How the New Marketplace Is Evolving And Jobs Created

The founders of A Writing Room know that the marketplace for writer assistance is fast changing, and they need to be quick to adapt to increased competition. Already, several developments are driving change in the field:

· The entrance of major online education companies (i.e. Masters Class , Coursera, Udemy ).

· Faculty recruitment of writers with built-in audiences of sizable twitter and other social media followings.

· Partnerships with the major publishers and agencies, who hold out the promise of publication to participants of the classes, retreats and collectives.

· Specializations by race and ethnicity, gender, geography and genre.

· Market segmentation, and attention to higher income consumers.

A number of these developments reflect the changes in the broader publishing world and are likely to continue. Overall, the marketplace itself will be expanding, as publishing technology advances, along with discretionary income.

The jobs being generated by this new marketplace are a mix of tech, administrative, and writing coach positions. At A Writing Room, recent hires include a community liaison, video editor, customer support, and a “beta reader” providing feedback to writers on their drafts. The hiring process is sweeping up into jobs not only workers who have been in the regular economy, but also residents of America’s bohemia: writers and artists who previously were outside of (and often scornful of) the market system. What can be better than that.

In his 2023 book, The Novel, Who Needs It , Joseph Epstein, former editor of American Scholar , offers a paean to fiction as above all other intellectual endeavors that seek to understand human behavior. But what he says of fiction is true of other writing (memoir, history, even forms of self-help) that arouses the mind.

Yes, there are way too many books published each year, and yes only a very small percentage of writers will earn any significant income from their writing. But who knows what individual book will succeed commercially or critically, or add to our shared knowledge or wisdom. And really, why not encourage the craft of writing. How much does America benefit from most of the paper-pushing, meetings and e-mails that now pass for work in our economy of affluence.

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Mon, 07/01/2024

Navigating Sheffield DocFest 2024: Rain or Shine

By Janay Boulos

“Pace yourself! It’s a marathon, not a race.” I know it’s a cliche, but I couldn’t find better words to explain my experience at Sheffield DocFest 2024. It’s a journey that demands endurance, strategic planning, and a balance between managing expectations and seizing opportunities. You shouldn’t expect too much from it, yet you should be prepared to embrace the unexpected. 

One of the leading documentary festivals, DocFest is a whirlwind of events—talks, panels, networking drinks, and parties until 2:00 a.m., then starting again at 9:00 a.m. the next morning. These events are where connections are made, ideas are exchanged, and sometimes, future collaborations are born. DocFest takes place in Sheffield, a vibrant city in South Yorkshire, UK, known for its rich industrial heritage, green spaces, and thriving cultural scene, despite being smaller in scale compared to London. I attended the festival to take meetings and network as I am currently producing two feature documentaries—but also to reconnect with friends and contacts I only see at industry events.

It was empowering to see a section of the festival dedicated to Palestinian films and Palestinian filmmakers. On Saturday, I attended the Palestinian delegation presentation, and it was a tearful event. As a Lebanese filmmaker, journalist, and first of all, a Lebanese citizen, the Palestinian struggle is not far from ours—we’re connected. In Lebanon, we’re witnessing towns in the south getting bombed daily and the threat of the war extending to the rest of my country. Giving a platform for the voices of these filmmakers, most of them suffering from having to live in exile, trying to find someone to listen to them and to their story, is a powerful statement on the work of the Palestinian Film Institute and on Sheffield DocFest for providing the space. These filmmakers want to let the world hear their stories, like all of us attending the festival with a film and a story close to us that we want the world to hear.

Navigating the Project Market

At the MeetMarket, filmmakers of 50 documentary projects at various stages of production underwent two days of pitching in one-to-one meetings, all with the same hope of securing funding, finding sales agents, getting commissioned, and meeting festival representatives. Also attending the festival were another 100 or more filmmakers looking for the same thing without the festival’s official matchmaking. I was one of them. For me, the key to setting up meetings is to first check the industry delegation list on the website, which is downloadable in an Excel format that makes it easier to narrow it down and navigate. And then reach out to people by email after you’ve made sure that they are suitable for your projects. 

I’d rather be one of those aspiring filmmakers than one of those so-called “decision makers.” How do you decide which project you come on board, when all of the stories are valid and important, all represent suffering, and come from the heart of local voices and filmmakers who want to create change and have the world hear them? For why else are we making these films but to express an injustice, a passion, a sorrow, and a joy we carry so dearly? And that’s why being one in thousands of aspiring filmmakers in the world is never a competition, but rather a community of storytellers who fight to keep talking, sharing, carrying legacies, and portraying stories. When we stop doing that, the world forgets, and history is written based on the strongest narrative. Therefore, we are all writing and making history. 

After Meetings, Go to Drinks Receptions

One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned from previous festivals is that networking at the various drinks receptions is crucial. Building a network at Sheffield DocFest requires a proactive approach. Emailing people beforehand might be disheartening, as no one really replies. But don’t get discouraged if you don’t receive immediate responses. Everyone at the festival is busy, juggling packed agendas. Sometimes luck plays a part, too—you might find yourself queuing for the bathroom with a person you’ve emailed to no avail. That happened to me. And I ended up sharing a bathroom visit, getting a drink, and having that meeting I thought would never happen.

And what is a better place to talk or a nicer setting in which to share stories than a rainy and windy June day, huddling underneath umbrellas at the networking drinks? Typical English weather graced us at Sheffield this DocFest, but the chatter was louder than the raindrops and thunder. People chatted, drank, laughed, and told stories about films they watched and those they want to make. The camaraderie among attendees is heartwarming. It’s a place where industry friends reconnect. Sometimes it’s the only place you get to see them throughout the year. The community is supportive and encouraging, making the experience enriching and memorable.

Don’t Forget to Watch Films

Amidst this chaos, finding time to watch documentaries is essential. Watching the selected documentaries as a filmmaker is critical for honing my craft. It’s inspiring and educational, offering insights and perspectives that can shape my storytelling. So, I had to step away from the drinks, and even wake up earlier than expected, to make time to watch the films I booked. On my first day at Sheffield DocFest, I missed a film I had booked,  Silent Men , which had its premiere, unfortunately, at the same time as the NatGeo networking drinks. The food and unlimited bar make these probably the most popular drinks at the festival. So to make up for it, and thanks to a dear friend, I woke up at 9:00 a.m. the next day to watch  Union . This documentary was eye-opening and made me think of the class struggle that often leads the powerful to repress the voices of the weak to maintain their dominance and control. It is the same in societies where the weak must rise to get their voices heard, even though they are on the right side of history. 

Check Out Panels and Exhibitions

And on the last couple of days, when the industry leaves and it is mostly filmmakers who are left, it’s time to enrich your knowledge. I attended a few panels this year, including the Al Jazeera Documentary breakfast talk; a panel about producing called “Right Money, Right Film”; and finally, the Alternate Realities Summit. I had briefly entered the Alternate Realities Exhibition [co-curated by IDA’s Keisha Knight and Abby Sun with Sheffield DocFest Creative Director Raul Niño Zambrano] where I got to wear a bat’s head mask and look at the world with bat vision ( Nocturnal Fugue ). I touched some sticky fingers, too ( Finger Rub Rug) . I did not know that a whole industry is shaping up to focus not only on the traditional visual filmmaking experience, but on the sensory one, where people are telling their stories using not just sight but all the senses. 

In the end, Sheffield DocFest isn’t just about the films or the deals—it’s about the people. It’s about the stories we tell and the connections we make that drive compassion, empathy, and all the synonyms that go along with these words. It’s vital to remember that storytelling is our way of planting seeds of hope and resilience. So, here’s to more stories, more connections, and more DocFests—rain or shine!

Janay Boulos is a Lebanese journalist and documentary producer based between her hometown, Byblos, and London. She produces feature and short documentaries from and about the Middle East focusing on social, political, and cultural stories told by voices of those with lived experiences.

• Sheffield DocFest
• Middle Eastern Media