On Creative Writing Courses

and Why I Believe in Them

It’s now a decade since Hanif Kureishi dismissed Creative Writing courses as a waste of time.

In the aftermath of his comments, the Guardian asked a number of writers — Rachel Cusk, Philip Hensher, Joyce Carol Oates, me — to respond.

What I said then remains my best defence of Creative Writing — particularly as part of continuing education. But there’s more to say.

Here’s my original words —

Although we give classes on the technical aspects of writing, one of the most basic things we give is more basic. It’s permission.

Permission, for example, for a student on the MA to say, ‘I’m sorry, I really can’t come out on Friday night – I have coursework.’

Because however supportive of a partner’s or friend’s or relative’s ambition to become a writer people are, they often aren’t very good at granting them the necessary time.

And, for most of us, it’s easier to say, ‘I have coursework’ than ‘I’m writing a novel – it’ll take me about five years, and might not get published’.

We also give students permission to experiment, and encouragement to try things that they think might fail.

Even quite late on in the course, when I’m advising students about what to write for their final dissertation, they will ask me, ‘Can I try this?’

They know it’s what they should do, they just need permission to do it. If they didn’t have someone they respected (because that person is a tutor, because they’ve been published) to say this, they might never dare – and much of their best work wouldn’t happen.

Finally, we – the teaching staff – give students permission to believe they might become ‘real’ writers.

Because, by being in the room with them, week after week, we help demystify what ‘real’ writers are.

Too many people write badly because they write up to their idea of what ‘real’ writing should be or what a ‘real’ writer should write. They put on literary airs.

If someone holds writers in too much esteem, they’ll never become one.

All of which I still agree with.

But since that time, Creative Writing has more and more come under attack. It is one of the courses dismissed as ‘Mickey Mouse’.

(Mickey Mouse was originally drawn and written by Walt Disney in 1928. If only all worthless wastes of time lasted so long, and created so many jobs, and generated so much money, and were so memorable.)

Creative Writing is one of the subject areas — as at Goldsmiths and the University at East Anglia — that faces the worst job cuts.

Perhaps this will change, with the new government’s less hostile attitude to higher education.

There’s a recognition that writing, along with the other arts, contributes hugely to the economy.

That’s the kind of sentence I really hate having to write. I’d prefer not to defend what I do in terms of money, though I think it is more than defensible that way.

Anyone who has taken a Creative Writing course — whether they got what they wanted out of it or not — knows it’s about far more than that.

What I didn’t get to say in the original Guardian piece was something a bit more fundamental. For many people, for undergraduates and retirees alike, an arts course is an answer to the question, ‘How do I want to live?’

We’re all asking this all the time. It influences what we buy, watch, think, love.

By taking an MA, by making that commitment to themselves as an artist, a person is redefining not just their priorities but themselves.

Their answer — their daring assertion — is, ‘I want to live creatively.’

In saying this, they’re taking a big psychic risk. But a positive one.

Because whoever they are at the end of their course, it will be someone who has tried to become better at doing something they love — something that is ultimately for other people — and something that will demand of them everything they can possibly give.

That is anything but a waste of time.

If you’re interested in taking an MA in Creative Writing, do get in touch.

I’m teaching down at the University of Southampton. If you were to study there, you’d definitely be in one of my workshops.