Courses in London & Online

Martin Amis, Julian Barnes, Ian McEwan and Kazuo Ishiguro are household names of contemporary British fiction. But how did their careers begin in the 1970s and 1980s? And how do their early efforts stand up today?

A selection of novels from 1960 to 1980, including Heinrich Boll's powerful psychological fiction, The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum; two works of speculative fiction, Marlen Haushofer's The Wall and Kay Dick's They; Latifa Zayyat's bildungsroman, The Open Door; and Mariama Ba's powerful exploration of mourning, So Long a Letter.

The short story has come to be seen as one of Irish Literature’s most celebrated forms of expression. From the early stories of George Moore and James Joyce, to modern classics by John McGahern, William Trevor and Claire Keegan, the short story has allowed Irish writers to pick apart the complexities of Irish society in powerful, precise and poetic terms. This course will explore some of the most iconic short stories of twentieth-century Irish literature.

Explore and discover extraordinary short stories from renowned women writers of the 1940s and 50s, which present an insight into a time of great change in Britain, when domestic situations were rewritten, social customs challenged and new freedoms embraced. Authors include Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Jane Howard, Penelope Mortimer, Elizabeth Taylor and Daphne du Maurier.