Writing Courses & Workshops Online & in London

The pursuit of happiness is ongoing. In the ancient Greek world this gave rise to several ‘philosophies of life’ that remain the cornerstone of contemporary attitudes. Join this course to explore their key sources.

Why have so many British authors set stories in and around an important house? How does the structure, history and atmosphere of a great house affect plot and narrative? And where do authors derive their inspiration to build fictional houses that capture readers’ imaginations so fully? The novels on this course all focus on one finely imagined house and demonstrate the author’s own personal concerns of the time.

Learn the basics of this captivating language with an emphasis on practical use and the development of your listening and speaking skills. Suitable for complete beginners. Learn to speak Hindi and develop your listening and speaking skills in this communicative class which emphasises the practical use of the language. Suitable for complete beginners.

The oldest profession as practised among the Romans - not for the squeamish.

This course will introduce and discuss two novels by eminent author, Muriel Spark- Memento Mori (1959) and The Ballad of Peckham Rye (1960). Her writing wilfully upends notions of conformity and acts as a disrupter to accepted conventions. Instead, ‘Spark beckons us to encounter the stranger’ (Marilyn Reizbaum). Playfully disrupting passive readers and stretching comfort zones, Spark’s work provides a space to access unaccustomed outlooks that make us rethink our relationship with ourselves, others, and the world. Instead of unconsciously going with the flow, she awakens us to life’s stranger things.

Explore the astonishing range of poetic responses to a hundred years of warfare, acts of witnessing, endurance, defiance and condemnation by writers across the globe: Sassoon and Wilfred Owen in Britain, Brecht, Milosz, Celan, Akhmatova and Stepanova in Europe and Russia, Darwish and Zhadan in the Middle East and Ukraine, and many others. How do they describe the indescribable? High art or doggerel, what does it matter once the bombs start to fall?

Explore the story of how Indian painted and printed cottons became an important trade commodity for the Western domestic market, and the far-reaching impact of their design and manufacture.

String quartets developed new musical forms and ensured success for many composers, whilst allowing an intimate conversation with their audiences. We trace the quartets of the masters from Haydn and Mozart to Shostakovich and beyond.

This course will be delivered online. See the ‘What is the course about?’ section in course details for more information.