MA in Creative Writing

[oggbashan]

My local university is offering a two-year part-time MA in Creative Writing: Prose Fiction.

It involves one evening a week, plus a second evening in alternate weeks, term time only.

I'm considering it, but can I justify the cost at nearly £5,000 for a recreational activity that earns me no money, and I have no intention of becoming an employee again?

Anyone have any experience of a similar course?

Og

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Here's how I sort things out.

After I completed the military course in automotive repair I could fix just about anything mechanical or electrical. I knew how to conceptualize and assess results.

After I completed a 4 year apprenticeship in sheet metal work I could do the same.

Ditto coursework for refrigeration and construction cost estimation.

After I completed 2 masters degrees I was fucking clueless about the criteria for successful outcome or how to assess results.

 

[oggbashan]

Here's how I sort things out.

...

After I completed 2 masters degrees I was fucking clueless about the criteria for successful outcome or how to assess results.

I can understand that. I took a degree course in Human Resource Management just because I needed the piece of paper to back up years of experience.

I ended up as an assistant tutor because I knew more than the lecturers.

And I didn't get my piece of paper. After a year's study the 36 who had started were reduced to 6, and I was the only one to pass all the examination for all the modules. All of the other 5 failed statistics which I found easy and 3 of them failed other modules too.

For some reason the university didn't want to continue for year 2 with only one student. They kept me on as a tutor for their MBA students.

Og

 

[lovecraft68]

My local university is offering a two-year part-time MA in Creative Writing: Prose Fiction.

It involves one evening a week, plus a second evening in alternate weeks, term time only.

I'm considering it, but can I justify the cost at nearly £5,000 for a recreational activity that earns me no money, and I have no intention of becoming an employee again?

Anyone have any experience of a similar course?

Og

I think the only question is do you enjoy writing enough that to get better would make you happier? That's the only thing that really matters no? If writing is your hobby and your passion why not indulge your passion?

 

[MagicaPractica]

How much enjoyment would you get out of it? I believe that is the real question. If you would get five thousand pounds worth of enjoyment out of it, then it is totally worth it. I have considered it but can't find the time right now.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Ha!

I enjoyed grad school, and it was a colossal waste of time and money. I hated mechanics school and it pays me dividends almost every day.

 

[The_Fool]

I don't see the paper as important, at least it would not be for me. The real question is can you learn anything from the curriculum? What I have considered is auditing some classes. You pay for them, but you don't really get a grade that counts. But that way, you can pick and choose the courses you want to take and are not forced to take those that have less relevance.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Yep. If you go thru a culinary school people expect you to whip up pancakes and eggs and potatoes et al. There's an assumption that youre competent to do things with food.

But with a college degree all bets are off. No warrants, no guarantees, hardly any expectations, even, that you can do anything related to your diploma.

 

[sr71plt]

Once your style and technique has been found and it seems to be working, I don't see much point in going through the creative writing courses. Maybe to pick up more tidbits and such, but that wouldn't require a master degree course.

 

[lettersaroundmidnight]

MA in creative writing

There are thousands of young men and women in the UK and other countries who are running up huge personal debts to study. Some do so for the pure enjoyment of it, others in the hope that the course they follow will get them into a profession or a job that they will love, and that may help them to pay off that debt in due time.

Can anyone name a successful author who has studied creative writing? Can anyone name a doctor who has not studied medicine?

You can take up a hobby that will cost you far more than £5,000.

In my view you pursue an academic course because you want to study it. If it allows you to earn money after and recoup some cash, that is a bonus; but it should not be the primary goal or reason.

If you take it, good luck and best wishes,

lettersaroundmidnight

PS when you make it famous remember us poor struggling writers

 

[sr71plt]

Can anyone name a successful author who has studied creative writing? Can anyone name a doctor who has not studied medicine?

Stephen King, John Grisham, and Tom Clancy--just off the top of my mind and striking at the big paychecks.

People somehow like to think that writers like this just dropped onto the best-seller's list with their first effort while working in a desk job. All three of these were creative writing undergraduate students.

I think creative writing courses can give you a good foundation when you are just starting development. Conversely, I think if you turn to them after you have developed your unique voice, style, and technique, these courses tend to beat all that made you unique out of you--if you take them very seriously.

But I don't knock getting the foundation or assume that the best-selling authors haven't.

 

[Weird Harold]

Can anyone name a successful author who has studied creative writing?

Brandon Sanderson -- chosen to complete the Wheel Of Time series by Robert Jardan's estate and a best-selling fantasy author in his own right -- not only studied creative wrting, he TAUGHT degree level Creative Writing. (at BYU, iirc.)

 

[voluptuary_manque]

I'm not quite as aged as Ogg but I am giving serious consideration to pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in woodworking. Yes, that is an actual degree and it's offered locally. Why would I want one? I collect letters after my name. Would it make my furniture more marketable? Possibly, but that's not the point. I just love the pomp and circumstance of academia. So, unless one either just loves going to school ('go find out' is the greatest game in the world after sex) or hopes to make enough money to recoup the costs, I wouldn't bother.

 

[oggbashan]

I'm not quite as aged as Ogg but I am giving serious consideration to pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in woodworking. Yes, that is an actual degree and it's offered locally. Why would I want one? I collect letters after my name. Would it make my furniture more marketable? Possibly, but that's not the point. I just love the pomp and circumstance of academia. So, unless one either just loves going to school ('go find out' is the greatest game in the world after sex) or hopes to make enough money to recoup the costs, I wouldn't bother.

My brother took his MA of Fine Arts, in Art History, in his seventies, adding to the BSc, MSc and PhD in Science obtained in his twenties and thirties.

My father started his Open University degree in his early 80s, and graduated.

Neither of them expected to make money from their late studies. I wouldn't expect to from an MA in Creative Writing.

Each of my three daughters has more letters after their name than I have, or ever will have, but they need them to further their careers.

My doubts are less about the cost and more about the utility of the course to improve my writing.

Og

 

[Firebrain]

Who's teaching it? Any particular published authors?

These things are usually more about making connections than what you can actually learn.

Edited to add: If all you write is erotica, be prepared to be laughed out of the classroom. Emphasis on these courses is usually on literary fiction and poetry.

 

[oggbashan]

Who's teaching it? Any particular published authors?

These things are usually more about making connections than what you can actually learn.

Edited to add: If all you write is erotica, be prepared to be laughed out of the classroom. Emphasis on these courses is usually on literary fiction and poetry.

Thank you, and other contributors to this thread.

The course is "Prose Fiction" but there are very few details of what the course will cover, how it will be taught and by whom. If I decide to consider it, I have enough contacts among the professors and other staff to get inside information even if the disciplines of those I know are mainly history, archaelogy and business.

At present it seems that the University doesn't know what the course will cover and who will lead it, if it actually starts. I have until mid-May to apply.

My own knowledge of literary fiction is fairly extensive. I'm already helping a friend with her PhD in some minor aspects of US detective fiction pre-1914.

Og

 

[Firebrain]

Thank you, and other contributors to this thread.

The course is "Prose Fiction" but there are very few details of what the course will cover, how it will be taught and by whom. If I decide to consider it, I have enough contacts among the professors and other staff to get inside information even if the disciplines of those I know are mainly history, archaelogy and business.

At present it seems that the University doesn't know what the course will cover and who will lead it, if it actually starts. I have until mid-May to apply.

My own knowledge of literary fiction is fairly extensive. I'm already helping a friend with her PhD in some minor aspects of US detective fiction pre-1914.

Og

Personally, I wouldn't take a course unless there were modules taught by successful authors. They aren't just there to teach you how to write -- it's more about the process of getting published. They can't do that without experience.

The main aim of a Masters in CW is usually to write a commercially publishable novel; this is what your tutors will expect you to be doing (usually in the form of a dissertation). There is a very heavy bias towards writing literary fiction on most (but not all) courses. If you want to write an erotic novel then it would be wise to enquire as to whether this would be suitable before applying.

If you just want to learn a bit more about writing then I would look into some of the OU courses.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

OG

After you get your diploma please explain to me how it is that so many writers create masterpieces in the beginning, and crap at the end of their careers.

 

[SuperHeroRalph]

My local university is offering a two-year part-time MA in Creative Writing: Prose Fiction.

It involves one evening a week, plus a second evening in alternate weeks, term time only.

I'm considering it, but can I justify the cost at nearly £5,000 for a recreational activity that earns me no money, and I have no intention of becoming an employee again?

Anyone have any experience of a similar course?

Og

Unless you plan on teaching, I don't see the need for an MFA.

You already have talent. Aside from the basic mechanics, no one can teach you how to write. Either you can or you can't.

There's nothing they can teach you that you can learn in a $1.50 in late charges at the public library.

My suggestion is read, when you're not writing and write, when you're not reading, but you do that already.

If it was me, I'd do it, if I had the time, committment, and extra money. For sure, it would be an enjoyable and fun thing to do.

Good luck in making your decision.

 

[LJ_Reloaded]

Personally, I wouldn't take a course unless there were modules taught by successful authors. They aren't just there to teach you how to write -- it's more about the process of getting published. They can't do that without experience.

The main aim of a Masters in CW is usually to write a commercially publishable novel; this is what your tutors will expect you to be doing (usually in the form of a dissertation). There is a very heavy bias towards writing literary fiction on most (but not all) courses. If you want to write an erotic novel then it would be wise to enquire as to whether this would be suitable before applying.

If you just want to learn a bit more about writing then I would look into some of the OU courses.

Why not just learn how to write well - if that's what you're aiming for with a Masters in CW - and use that skill to write erotica under a pseudonym?

You can easily parlay the writing of good literary fiction into an erotic novel. And what's wrong with camouflaging the erotica in the background of a real story?

 

[LJ_Reloaded]

OG

After you get your diploma please explain to me how it is that so many writers create masterpieces in the beginning, and crap at the end of their careers.

Like who?

 

[oggbashan]

...If you just want to learn a bit more about writing then I would look into some of the OU courses.

Thank you. I'll do that.

In the past I attended two years of creative writing evening classes. The beginning of the first term was a disaster. At the first session the tutor asked if any of us had published anything, whether fiction or not.

I thought she really wanted to know. I was looking for a new job at the time so I had a copy of my CV with me, including the appendices on my training etc. I made the mistake of producing my list of published works, all technical non-fiction. She was upset because my list was much longer than hers. She didn't seem to understand that writing instruction manuals, technical reports and obscure industry-based text books was a different discipline from writing creative fiction.

Fortunately she was only teaching the first three lessons. The tutor who followed her knew the difference between technical writing and fiction.

What I found awkward about the evening classes was that I could produce several stories every week while many of the other students struggled to write a couple of paragraphs.

Og

 

[Firebrain]

I find most creative writing classes useless, to be honest (although I only have experience of those in the classrooms). I've heard good things about some of the OU ones.

Literary agents Curtis Brown (very big) are also going to run some intensive courses soon in London and they're a lot cheaper than the MA. It would be very interesting to see what those entailed; I imagine they'd do more for you professionally than an MA, to be honest.

http://www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/

 

[oggbashan]

I find most creative writing classes useless, to be honest (although I only have experience of those in the classrooms). I've heard good things about some of the OU ones.

Literary agents Curtis Brown (very big) are also going to run some intensive courses soon in London and they're a lot cheaper than the MA. It would be very interesting to see what those entailed; I imagine they'd do more for you professionally than an MA, to be honest.

http://www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/

They might be better, but I live too far from London to make such a commitment. I would need to stay in a hotel one night a week.

Og

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Like who?

Stephen King comes to mind but most writers seem to run out of gas after a few jewels. Le Carre is another.