Creative Writing - Advanced Fiction and Writing for Performance University of Cambridge

Overview

Throughout the Creative Writing - Advanced Fiction and Writing for Performance course from the University of Cambridge you'll apply fiction skills and tools to your own work and later test scriptwriting techniques. We'll also interrogate some of the moral and ethical questions around creative writing, representation, and technology.

During this part-time online diploma course, you will:

• strengthen your creative writing skills
• develop academic skills in research, analysis, evaluation and problem-solving
• read a variety of texts to explore different writing techniques
• prepare for further study at postgraduate level

On completion of this course, you will be able to continue your studies by concluding a full bachelor’s degree with honours at The Open University. Find out more here. 

Through close reading of published work across a range of genres, we will consider some of ‘the rules’ of writing and how to break them. We will also explore the art of writing for performance, and you will learn how to apply techniques used in scriptwriting to your own work. 

As a student in our learning community, you will: 

• learn how a variety of literary elements can create original and high-concept fiction, with a focus on fantasy, tragedy, comedy and historical fiction
• study the fairy tale to modern-day magical realism and fantasy novels
• learn about the tragic hero and the fatal flaw in relation to shaping character and plot
• explore the modern historical novel and the most effective ways to bring the past to life
• discover how to overcome the obstacles of how, what and why we write
• study techniques used in writing for TV, film, stage and radio and examine how they are transferable to other forms of writing
• explore the art of adapting a story from a different medium