Writing Courses & Workshops Online & in London
Be inspired to write, and learn how to get published at the college where Andrea Levy, Malorie Blackman, Anna Burns, and other celebrated authors studied. Read our success stories to see what's possible for you as a writer.
Learn from published authors
Whether you're just starting out or ready to publish your first book, the benefits of our writing courses include expert tuition from a published author and feedback on your work as you develop your writing skills. There will also be opportunities to participate in group discussions and activities with fellow students.
Unheard Voices Scholarship
City Lit’s Malorie Blackman Scholarships for 'Unheard Voices' provide three annual awards to fund one year’s study within the Creative Writing department at City Lit. Learn more >
See what it's like be part a City Lit online creative writing course.
- Nineteenth Century American Literary ClassicsCourse start date: Fri 26 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Richard NilandThis class explores the wonderful world of 19th century American literature, reading classic texts to broaden knowledge of literary history through a range of influential novels, stories, and poems. Among the writers considered in their literary, political, and cultural contexts will be Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Herman Melville, Mark Twain and Kate Chopin.Full fee £219.00 Senior fee £175.00 Concession £142.00 - The East End in Fact and FictionCourse start date: Sat 27 Sep 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Sarah WiseCovering the early 19th century to the early 20th century, we will examine the East End and analyse how it was portrayed in works of fiction, thinking about how imaginative fiction and historical fact intertwine to create local legend.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Poetry Reading GroupCourse start date: Wed 1 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Sophie OxenhamThis Poetry Reading Group explores a wide range of poetry across different themes and periods, in a supportive and friendly group. Each week we will read and discuss a selection of 2-4 poems, focusing on a different theme each session. The tutor will select poetry from different poets, forms and periods, introducing you to a broad range of poetic voices and perspectives. Poetry is for everyone - come and join us!
Full fee £219.00 Senior fee £175.00 Concession £142.00 - Aldous Huxley and His ContemporariesCourse start date: Fri 3 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
During the 1920s, Aldous Huxley was beguiled by D.H. Lawrence and his life-affirming philosophy, but after moving to California in 1937 he became increasingly influenced by mysticism. He was initiated by Swami Prabhavananda of the Hollywood Vedanta Society, who would become Christopher Isherwood’s guru. On this course, we will explore how the spiritual interests of these British writers shaped the literary work they wrote in America.Full fee £179.00 Senior fee £143.00 Concession £116.00 - Crime fiction reading groupCourse start date: Wed 8 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Christine HawkinsAre you obsessed with reading crime fiction? You might like to join our Crime fiction reading group, where we share thoughts and ideas about what you are reading, with books chosen by the group. Please come to the first session with suggestions (crime fiction in paperback) and having read 'The Big Sleep' by Rayond Chandler. Monthly meetings take place on 8/10, 5/11, 3/12, 21/1, 18/2, 18/3, 6/5, 3/6, 1/7.Full fee £189.00 Senior fee £189.00 Concession £123.00 - Contemporary Body Horror: Bodies, Trauma, and TransformationCourse start date: Thu 9 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Katie GossThis in-college literature course delves into the provocative and unsettling world of contemporary body horror - primarily by femme and queer authors. Over six-weeks we will explore how writers reframe the body as a site of both violence and transformation: using aesthetics of the uncanny, grotesque or abject to disturb and overturn societal norms surrounding gender, sexuality, identity, and power.Full fee £179.00 Senior fee £143.00 Concession £116.00 - What is a Short Story?Course start date: Sat 18 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Alexander Fairbairn-DixonWhat is a short story? Come and discuss its characteristics, its length, design, mood and style. What distinguishes it from other kinds of short narrative? We’ll compare short stories to other forms, such as myths, legends, anecdotes, fabliaux, parables, fables, and ‘tales’. We’ll look at some of the greatest practitioners including Edgar Allan Poe, Katherine Mansfield, and O’ Henry.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Journeys to the UnderworldCourse start date: Tue 21 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
The katabasis or journey into the underworld is a standard element of many classical texts. This course explores what this journey and the return to the world above means in a selection of Greek and Roman texts with examples taken from mythological poetry, epic, and Athenian drama. We will also look at how later writers (Joseph Conrad, Margaret Atwood, Elena Ferrante) adopt and adapt this trope using it to explore colonialism, feminism and motherhood.Full fee £219.00 Senior fee £175.00 Concession £142.00 - The Contemporary Global NovelCourse start date: Fri 7 Nov 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Rebecca JonesAre you curious about reading contemporary global literature? Would you like to understand what we mean by the ‘global novel’, reading across cultures and national borders? This in-college course will introduce you to the study of global literature through reading three brilliant 21st century global novels: Mohsin Hamid’s Exit West, Rana Dasgupta’s Tokyo Cancelled and Julie Otsuka’s Buddha in the Attic.Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £149.00 Concession £97.00 - Borderlines of Madness in 20th century FictionCourse start date: Sat 29 Nov 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Sarah WiseWe will explore various themes related to ‘insanity’ and altered states of consciousness by examining a number of 19th-century works of fiction. Novelists and poets often had the greatest insights into the workings of the mind, and many Victorian psychiatrists cited works of fiction in their case studies. Among the authors we will cover are Charlotte Bronte, Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins, Gogol, Herman Melville and Charlotte Perkins Gilman.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Masterworks of 19th Century French and Russian literatureCourse start date: Tue 29 Apr 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Richard NilandThis class explores classic texts of 19th century French and Russian literature, discussing literary style, themes, and contexts as a way of developing and sharing responses to celebrated European writing. Among the French writers examined will be Balzac, Baudelaire, Flaubert and Rimbaud, with our Russians including Gogol, Dostoevsky, and Chekhov.Full fee £199.00 Senior fee £159.00 Concession £129.00 - First Novels Revisited: Amis, McEwan, Barnes, IshiguroCourse start date: Tue 29 Apr 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Lewis WardMartin 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?Full fee £169.00 Senior fee £169.00 Concession £110.00 - Tales from everywhere: international fictions from the 20th centuryCourse start date: Wed 30 Apr 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Aamer HusseinA 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.Full fee £249.00 Senior fee £199.00 Concession £162.00 - The Open Road: classics of living on the roadCourse start date: Wed 7 May 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Julian BirkettIt was that great literary voyager Robert Louis Stevenson who said “It is better to travel hopefully than to arrive”. Whether it's to the sound of train wheels, hoofbeats, car tyres or marching feet, and not knowing where day’s end will find you, there is an exhilaration in being on the open road. And the twentieth century saw a host of stirring accounts of journeys made in search of a special kind of freedom. Some of them have become literary classics.Full fee £169.00 Senior fee £135.00 Concession £110.00 - The History of the Irish short story: from James Joyce to Claire KeeganCourse start date: Tue 29 Apr 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Richard NilandThe 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.Full fee £169.00 Senior fee £135.00 Concession £110.00
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