MA Creative Writing
This programme is subject to validation.
Our Creative Writing programmes will build your confidence and technical ability in composing creative prose and poetry, while also developing a deeper and more extensive critical awareness of the cultural, literary and theoretical history of text production.
These programmes are designed to assist aspiring writers with honing and developing their writing skills in prose fiction and poetry. We will help you to locate your work in historical and cultural context, and you will become familiar with the history of literary production.
The programme will equip you with the research and writing skills you will need to produce both critically informed prose or poetry and creative criticism. You will also have the chance to reflect productively on both the creative process itself and the finished work that has resulted from it.
The MA in Creative Writing is taught by published writers and research-active academics expert in their fields.
Entry standards
Applicants should have a first or upper second class degree (or equivalent) and will be asked as part of the application procedure to provide a portfolio of creative material (5000 words prose or equivalent). In exceptional cases, students with a proven commitment to creative writing but no first degree may also be admitted.
English language requirements
Non-native speakers of English will normally be required to have IELTS 7.0 or above with 7.0 or more in writing (or equivalent) and a minimum of 6.0 in other components.
Please note that the University of Surrey offers English language programmes and is also an IELTS Test Centre.
MA Creative Writing - structure and modules
Compulsory Modules
Creative Writing Workshop
Weekly themed workshops in which all students read from and discuss work produced and circulated in advance of the class.
Literary Scholarship and Creativity
A joint seminar with students from the MA in English Literature, exploring the ways in which changing modes of text production and circulation have shaped the course of literary history, from Caxton to Kindle.
Research Skills
A joint seminar with students from the MA in English Literature, introducing key techniques and approaches shared by both critical and creative writing. Over two semesters these seminars take students all the way through the composition process from the initial research, planning and plotting stages all the way through to revising and editing an extended and highly-developed finished piece of writing.
Optional Modules
Optional modules available will vary from year to year but include some of the following:
- Advanced Studies in 19th-Century Literature and Culture
- Advanced Studies in 20th- and 21st-Century Literature and Culture
- Contemporary British and American Poetry
- Creative Identities
- Creative Non-fiction
- Critical and Cultural Theory
- Genre Writing
- Humour in Literature
- Realism and its Critics
- Theorizing Gender and Sexuality
- Semester-long ‘special author’ critical studies and creative pieces
The programme consists of three compulsory modules each semester and a choice of two optional modules over the course of the academic year.
All students are expected to produce a creative writing dissertation – an extended piece or portfolio of prose work or poetry with self-reflexive critical commentary.
MA Creative Writing - entry standards
Entry standards
Applicants should have a first or upper second class degree (or equivalent) and will be asked as part of the application procedure to provide a portfolio of creative material (5000 words prose or equivalent). In exceptional cases, students with a proven commitment to creative writing but no first degree may also be admitted.
English language requirements
Non-native speakers of English will normally be required to have IELTS 7.0 or above with 7.0 or more in writing (or equivalent) and a minimum of 6.0 in other components.
Please note that the University of Surrey offers English language programmes and is also an IELTS Test Centre.
Planned intake
Up to 15
Start date
October 2012
Programme Director
MA Creative Writing - fees and funding
Fees
UK/EU - £5,740
Overseas - £12,705
Funding
Subject to the ongoing Faculty review of postgraduate bursaries, we aim to offer a competitive scholarship scheme.
MA Creative Writing - professional context
Careers
The MA in Creative Writing provides a strong foundation in the core skills necessary to embark upon PhD research or a career in writing, communications, publishing, marketing, advertising, journalism or teaching.
MA Creative Writing - teaching
Teaching
English at the University of Surrey is a dynamic and innovative discipline, with established undergraduate and postgraduate research programmes in both English Literature and Creative Writing.
Teaching is research-led, with the MA in Creative Writing designed to reflect the individual expertise and passion of the members of staff who teach on it.
As an MA student in Creative Writing, you will benefit from the expertise of a vibrant, multidisciplinary group of academics.
You will also have access to a number of conferences, seminars and workshops hosted throughout the year. These events cover a range of topics to broaden your thinking in the fields of literature, language and linguistics, cultural studies and creative writing. Writers to have recently visited the University of Surrey include the novelist Monica Ali and the poet and critic Rod Mengham.
Each year’s cultural activities begin with a poetry lecture on campus by a visiting speaker and featuring readings by students at the Guildford School of Acting.
They reach a climax with the summer’s annual Morag Morris Poetry Festival, held in Guildford, which combines readings and performances by prominent, innovative and up-and-coming poets with the opportunity for Creative Writing students to present their own work in public.
This event is organised and hosted by our poet-in-residence – a position that is held by a different poet each year. English at Surrey also has a close relationship with English PEN, the charity dedicated to promoting literature and human rights.
Staff perspective
Dr Paul Vlitos
Our lively and distinctive MA programme in Creative Writing builds on the success of our undergraduate and PhD programmes in Creative Writing, offering students the chance to develop as writers while simultaneously pursuing their research interests, literary passions and individual creative paths.
This flexible programme enable students to receive regular peer and tutor feedback on their writing, while also encouraging them to explore the history of literature and culture.
Encouraged to grow and develop as writers through thoughtful and critically-informed reflection on their own creative work, MA students in Creative Writing are given the opportunity to consider the ever-changing relationship between writers, publishers and the public – not only how great works of the past came to be written in the form that they did, but how they circulated as texts and were received and read.
The course’s innovative range of optional modules will offer students the chance to study, analyze and produce work in a variety of modes that other Creative Writing programmes have neglected.
Optional topics which may be explored each year include: Creative Non-Fiction (including travel writing and life writing), ‘Genres’ of fiction (from the detective novel to science fiction, and beyond), ‘Humour in Literature’ (past and present) and ‘Realism and its Critics’ (which juxtaposes self-consciously experimental and formally innovative writing with more formally conventional and self-proclaimedly realistic fiction – and invites students both to think and to write across the battlelines generally assumed to exist between the two).
The MA programme in Creative Writing at the University of Surrey produces graduates who read carefully, express themselves effectively, and think critically. The skills it helps students to develop are invaluable not only for professional writers but as valuable stepping stones to a wide range of rewarding careers.
MA Creative Writing - learning
With the exception of the dissertation proposal and the dissertation itself, modules will be assessed either by a 3000 word essay or a 3000 word (or equivalent) creative writing submission, including between 500 and 1000 words of critical self-reflection.
The Creative Writing Dissertation will contribute a third of the final grade for the MA. It is expected to be 12,000 to 15,000 words in length. Creative work should make up 9000 to 13,000 words of this (or equivalent for poetry), along with 2000 to 3000 words of self-reflexive critical commentary.
The word count for students submitting a poetry dissertation will be negotiated with their supervisor, although as a rule of thumb 5 000 words’ prose is felt to be the equivalent of 150 lines poetry.
MA Creative Writing - graduate profile
MA Creative Writing - more
MA Creative Writing - apply
You can apply for this programme online using the link(s) below. We recommend making an application as soon as you can, even if you do not have all the necessary supporting information ready at that time.
As part of the application process, you will be asked to enter a username and password. If you've used our application system before, please enter your details or click the forgotten password link.
If you are a new user, you will need to create a username and password by clicking the New User button.
Start date
October 2012
Programme length
12 months full time or 24 months part timeProgramme Director
For general enquiries
T: 0800 980 3200 or
+44 (0)1483 681681
E: pg-enquiries@surrey.ac.uk
For admissions enquiries
T: +44 (0)1483 686243
E: english-admissions@surrey.ac.uk
Find out more
Department of English
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