̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - creative writing

Submissions open for BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ��

Anonymous — Fri, 15 Jan 2021 12:14:44 +0000

̽��ֱ��BBC National Short Story Award is one of the most prestigious for a single short story, with the winning author receiving £15,000, and four further shortlisted authors £600 each. ̽��ֱ��stories will be broadcast on Radio 4 and published in an anthology by Comma Press.

̽��ֱ��2020 winner of the BBC National Short Story Award was Sarah Hall for ‘ ̽��ֱ��Grotesques’, a timeless and unsettling story set against a backdrop of privilege and inequality in a university town. This was the second win for Hall who also won the prize in 2013. Previous alumni of the award include Lionel Shriver, Zadie Smith, Hilary Mantel, Jon McGregor, Ingrid Persaud, Cynan Jones and Jo Lloyd.

̽��ֱ��writers shortlisted for the BBC Young Writers’ Award have their stories narrated by an actor, recorded for a BBC podcast, and published in an anthology. ̽��ֱ��winner of the 2020 BBC Young Writers’ Award was Lottie Mills for her story inspired by her experience of disability, ‘ ̽��ֱ��Changeling.’ Both winning stories are available to listen to on BBC Sounds.

This is the first year of a new three-year partnership with the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, including Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library, the Faculty of English, Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education and for the first time, the Fitzwilliam Museum.

Dr Lisa Mullen from the ̽��ֱ��’s Faculty of English and Director of Studies at Downing College said: “ ̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge is delighted to be collaborating with the BBC again on these awards, and to support and nurture both new and established short-story writers.

“Stories are at the heart of our shared human experience, and Cambridge's Faculty of English, Institute of Continuing Education, the ̽��ֱ�� Library and Fitzwilliam Museum all have a special interest in how this dynamic form of fiction responds to a changing world.”

̽��ֱ��BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award are now open for submissions. Novelist and former Radio 4 Commissioning Editor for Arts James Runcie will chair the judging panel for the BBC National Short Story Award, an award that has enriched both the careers of writers and the wider literary landscape since its launch sixteen years ago.

Runcie said: “I am so delighted to chair the 2021 BBC National Short Story Awards. We need imaginative alternatives in these dark times: stories that question and surprise and open up new worlds.

“They can be short or long. They can take place in the past, present, future, or even all three at once. They can be set in a nutshell or in infinite space. But what I think we’ll be looking for is uniqueness of vision, a distinctive tone, curiosity, intrigue, surprise: an invitation to the reader’s imagination. I can’t wait to get started.”

Chair of the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is BBC Radio 1 Presenter Katie Thistleton. She chairs the judging panel for the teenage award for the fourth time as it opens for submissions for the seventh year. Thistleton is a writer and the co-host of Radio 1’s Life Hacks and ̽��ֱ��Official Chart: First Look on Radio 1. ̽��ֱ��BBC Young Writers’ Award is open to writers between the ages of 14-18 years.

Thistleton said: “I’m really looking forward to chairing the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� again for 2021. As a keen writer myself, and someone who loved entering writing competitions when I was younger, I know how important and exciting this opportunity is.”

Runcie and Thistleton will be joined by a group of acclaimed writers and critics on their respective panels.

For the BBC National Short Story Award: Booker Prize shortlisted novelist Fiona Mozley; award winning writer, poet and winner of the Desmond Elliott Prize, Derek Owusu; multi-award winning Irish novelist and short story writer, Donal Ryan; and returning judge, Di Speirs, Books Editor at BBC Radio.

For the BBC Young Writers’ Award, Thistleton will be joined by bestselling, highly acclaimed Irish YA author, Louise O’Neill; twenty-year old singer-songwriter Arlo Parks; Sunday Times bestselling author and actor Robert Webb; and Guardian Children’s Fiction Award winner Alex Wheatle.

Full Terms and Conditions for the NSSA and YWA are available with submissions accepted online at www.bbc.co.uk/nssa and www.bbc.co.uk/ywa. The deadline for receipt of entries for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT) Monday 15th March 2021. The deadline for receipt of entries for the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT) Monday 22nd March 2021.

̽��ֱ��shortlist for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be announced on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row at 7.15pm on Friday 10th September 2021. ̽��ֱ��shortlist for the BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be announced on Radio 1’s Life Hacks from 4pm on Sunday 19th September 2021.

̽��ֱ��stories shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 from Monday 13th to Friday 17th September 2021 from 3.30pm to 4pm.

̽��ֱ��announcement of the winners of the two awards will be broadcast live from the award ceremony at BBC Broadcasting House on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row from 7.15pm on Tuesday 5th October 2021.

Novelist James Runcie and broadcaster Katie Thistleton will chair the judging panels for the 2021 BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ��, and submissions are now open.

Stories are at the heart of our shared human experience, and Cambridge's Faculty of English, Institute of Continuing Education, the ̽��ֱ�� Library and Fitzwilliam Museum all have a special interest in how this dynamic form of fiction responds to a changing world

Dr Lucy Mullen

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright © ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – as here, on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

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Children’s fiction on terror is leading a youth ‘write-back’ against post-9/11 paranoia

tdk25 — Sun, 23 Aug 2020 23:26:09 +0000

̽��ֱ��study, by Dr Blanka Grzegorczyk at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, charts the emergence over almost two decades since 9/11 of a distinctive sub-genre in British children’s literature, focusing on themes of terrorism and counter-terror. Many of its authors, she argues, are “writing, rather than fighting, back”: against the simplistic and frequently racist terms in which extremism, immigration and Islam are often framed by politicians and the media.

This writing includes the novels of established and emerging writers such as Malorie Blackman, Muhammad Khan, and Anna Perera. ̽��ֱ��books themselves often confront young readers with depictions of violence, perpetrated both by terrorists and the state, and feature young protagonists who are variously victims, witnesses or participants in wars linked to terror.

Grzegorczyk, a lecturer and researcher at the Faculty of Education, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, argues that these books are encouraging a generation of young people who will become adults in the 2020s to challenge the cultural paranoia of the post-9/11 Britain in which they have grown up.

“One achievement of these authors has been to create a safe space for children to get past the kind of thinking, popularised by successive governments, that the natural consequence of terrorism is constantly having to be vigilant to and to fear the enemy ‘other’ against whom the state is therefore justified to mobilise,” Grzegorczyk said.

“These are books that often expose the inequalities and prejudices that lie behind that. They invite the post-terror generation to think about what needs to change and why, and how to resist the racism and Islamophobia that have been rampant in British society since before they were born. It’s writing as activism, and it invites an activist response.”

Other research has documented how the wars on terror, as well as more recent atrocities such as the Manchester Arena bombing, have preyed on the minds of a generation of young people now on the verge of adulthood. A study in 2018 by the research company Childwise, for example, found that one in three children aged nine to 16 worried about war, terrorism and global conflict more than anything else.

Grzegorczyk’s book, Terror and Counter-Terror in Contemporary Children’s Literature is the first study which examines the impact of a deliberate effort by children’s publishers following 9/11 and 7/7 to commission novels dealing with those themes.

It analyses dozens of titles: among them Anna Perera’s Guantanamo Boy, about an ordinary boy from Rochdale who is torn from his family and incarcerated without charge; and An Act Of Love by Alan Gibbons, which follows the divergent paths of two childhood friends into the British Army and terrorism.

Many books also explore the overlap between extremism, discriminatory profiling, and gender and social inequality. They include Muhammad Khan’s I Am Thunder, about a British Asian girl whose sense of marginalisation leaves her vulnerable to radicalisation; Nikesh Shukla’s Run, Riot, about a group of teenagers who are pursued by the police after one of them films the politically-sanctioned murder of an ethnic minority youth; and Rachel Anderson’s Asylum: a 2011 novel which prefigures the Grenfell tragedy with its depiction of a condemned London tower block crowded with asylum seekers, migrants and poor families.

Grzegorczyk’s analysis found that a recurrent theme of this literature is that it presents violence as the ‘common language’ of terrorists and governments. ̽��ֱ��novels often feature young protagonists who must form alliances across racial, cultural, religious or national divides to confront the limits of such vocabulary and give expression to a common humanity.

She argues that this encourages readers not only to imagine a future based on shared values, but to think critically about the forces that have shaped the violence, fear and suspicion endemic in British society post-9/11 and 7/7.

̽��ֱ��survey also argues that this politically engaged and charged wave of literature – through its vivid depictions of aggression, retaliation and prejudice – has offered a generation of young readers who have endured the ‘slow terror’ of constant exposure to atrocities in the media a way to handle that creeping trauma while empathising with those who have experienced it directly.

As a result, Grzegorczyk says, the novels frequently underscore the inequalities between wealthy, privileged, white young Britons – who typically only witness violence and prejudice through the media – and those from other communities and ethnicities, in Britain and elsewhere, for whom it is ever-present.

In addition, she suggests, such writing may add fresh momentum and inspiration to a new wave of youth activism, seen in movements such as Fridays For Future, American youth campaigns against gun violence, and Black Lives Matter – which involve similar expressions of cross-cultural solidarity as those found in the novels themselves.

“At one level this fiction is writing, rather than fighting, back against a resurgence of racist and anti-immigrant sentiment in British culture in the context of terrorism,” Grzegorczyk added.

“But it also positions young people as the agents of that resistance, and energises readers to take action. At a time when we are seeing a young generation speaking up, these books are pointing them towards a new kind of connectedness across cultures that moves us on from previous generations’ fixation with ‘us against them’.”

Terror and Counter-Terror in Contemporary Children’s Literature is published by Routledge.

A wave of children’s fiction which tackles subjects such as suicide terrorism, militant jihadism and counter-terror violence is helping young readers to rethink and resist extremism and Islamophobia, new research suggests.

It’s writing as activism, and it invites an activist response

Blanka Grzegorczyk

Yes

Submissions open for BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ��

sjr81 — Thu, 13 Dec 2018 15:31:35 +0000

̽��ֱ��BBC National Short Story Award is one of the most prestigious prizes for a single short story, with the winning author receiving £15,000, and four further shortlisted authors £600 each. ̽��ֱ��stories are broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and published in an anthology.

̽��ֱ��2018 winner of the BBC National Short Story Award was Trinidadian writer Ingrid Persaud, who won for ̽��ֱ��Sweet Sop, her ‘tender and ebullient’ story about a father-son relationship. Persaud’s 2018 victory was announced during a live broadcast of BBC Radio 4’s Front Row from Cambridge ̽��ֱ��’s West Road Concert Hall, with the winner of the 2018 BBC Young Writers’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� also revealed, before a reception at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library.

Previous alumni include Lionel Shriver, Zadie Smith, Hilary Mantel, Jon McGregor and William Trevor.

This year marks the 14th year of the award with broadcaster Nikki Bedi chairing the judging panel for 2019. Nikki is a television and radio broadcaster who writes and presents ̽��ֱ��Arts Hour on BBC World Service and BBC Radio London. Her counterpart on the BBC Young Writers’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� (YWA) is BBC Radio 1 and CBBC’s Book Club presenter Katie Thistleton, who will chair the judging panel for the teenage award for the second time as it opens for submissions for the fifth year.

Bedi and Thistleton will be joined by an esteemed group of award-winning writers and artists on their respective panels. For the BBC National Short Story Award: novelist and writer of narrative non-fiction, Richard Beard; short story writer, novelist and youngest author to be shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, Daisy Johnson; screenwriter, novelist and 2017 BBC National Short Story Award winner, Cynan Jones; and returning judge, Di Speirs, Books Editor at BBC Radio.

For the BBC Young Writers’ Award, Thistleton will lead former teacher and Betty Trask Award winner, Anthony Cartwright; Waterstones Prize and YA Bookseller Prize-winning writer, Patrice Lawrence; winner of the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize and British Book Awards Children’s Book of the Year children’s author, Kiran Millwood Hargrave; and writer, rapper and world-record breaking human beatboxer, Testament.

James Gazzard, Director of Cambridge’s Institute of Continuing Education, home to the Centre for Creative Writing, said: “Cambridge has produced great writers for many hundreds of years, and we look forward to discovering the new and diverse writers these awards give a voice to.

“This collaboration with the BBC and First Story contributes to the ̽��ֱ��’s and our Vice-Chancellor’s commitment of opening up Cambridge to all, to nurturing talent in new ways, while drawing on the unique teaching and academic environment that the ̽��ֱ�� famously provides. We were delighted with the numbers of writers who decided to take part last year. ̽��ֱ��success of First Story’s Young Writer’s Festival on our Sidgwick Site – as well as our own Short Story Festival at Madingley Hall – proved that the form is not only alive and well, but thriving.”

Nikki Bedi, Chair of the 2019 BBC National Short Story Award Judging Panel, said “ ̽��ֱ��short story is my favourite form of literature and there is nothing more delicious and perfect for me than devouring, digesting and loving a surprising and perfectly formed short story. From sneakily reading my parents’ copies of Roald Dahl’s dark works when I was far too young, I developed a taste for the form that has never left me.

"There are so many undiscovered voices and stories waiting to be told out there and we’ll be in the privileged position of receiving and reading them. I’m looking forward to works that transport me to new places, physically and culturally.”

̽��ֱ��writers shortlisted for the BBC Young Writers’ Award have their stories broadcast on a special Radio 1’s Life Hacks Podcast, and published in an anthology. Entrants can access a virtual treasure trove for writing inspiration courtesy of Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library’s specially curated digital archive. ̽��ֱ��winner of the 2018 Young Writers’ Award was 17-year-old Davina Bacon for her ‘compassionate’ and ‘intelligent’ story Under a Deep Blue Sky. ̽��ֱ��previous winners are Brennig Davies for Skinning, Lizzie Freestone for Ode to a Boy Musician and 2017 winner, Elizabeth Ryder for ̽��ֱ��Roses.

In addition, the BBC Student Critics’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� (SCA) launches today and calls for applications. 2018 saw 600 16–18-year-old students from 40 schools flex their critical muscles as they read, discussed and critiqued the five shortlisted NSSA stories. For 2019, this activity is being extended to encourage wider community link-ups between schools, colleges, libraries and bookshops around the UK.

Full Terms and Conditions for the NSSA and YWA are available with submissions accepted online at www.bbc.co.uk/nssa and www.bbc.co.uk/ywa from 9am (GMT), 13th December 2018. ̽��ֱ��Terms and Conditions for the BBC Student Critics’ Award can be found here. The deadline for receipt of entries for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT) Monday, 11th March, 2019. The deadline for receipt of entries for the BBC Young Writers’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT), Monday, 25th March, 2019. ̽��ֱ��deadline for receipt of applications for the BBC Student Critics’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� is 9am (GMT), Monday, 1st April, 2019.

̽��ֱ��shortlist for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be announced on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row at 7.15pm on Friday, 6th September, 2019. Readings of the shortlisted stories will broadcast on BBC Radio 4 from Monday 9th to Friday 13th September and interviews with the shortlisted writers will air from Friday, 6th September, 2019 on Front Row. ̽��ֱ��shortlist for the BBC Young Writers’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be announced on Radio 1’s Life Hacks from 4pm on Sunday, 22nd September, 2019.

̽��ֱ��announcement of the winners of the BBC National Short Story Award and BBC Young Writers’ Award will be broadcast live from the Award ceremony in BBC Broadcasting House on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row from 7.15pm on Tuesday, 1st October, 2019.

Booker Prize shortlistee Daisy Johnson and beatboxer Testament have today been announced as judges of the BBC’s National Short Story Award and Young Writers’ Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� and First Story – as submissions for the 2019 competitions open.

Cambridge has produced great writers for many hundreds of years, and we look forward to discovering the new and diverse writers these awards give a voice to.

James Gazzard

2018 winner Ingrid Persaud accepts her award at the West Road ceremony earlier this year.

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Cambridge ceremony reveals the winners of BBC Short Story and Young Writers’ Awards

sjr81 — Tue, 02 Oct 2018 18:45:20 +0000

Announced this evening during a live broadcast of BBC Radio 4’s ‘Front Row’ from the ̽��ֱ��’s West Road Concert Hall, Persaud was presented with the £15,000 prize for a work described by judge and previous winner of the award, K J Orr as “tender and ebullient, heartbreaking and full of humour”.

Meanwhile, the winner of the 2018 BBC Young Writers’ Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� was also revealed, before a reception for all the winning and shortlisted writers at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library.

Davina Bacon from Cambridgeshire won with ‘Under a Deep Blue Sky’, a raw and emotionally powerful short story about a young African poacher and the brutal murder of a mother and baby elephant.

Chair of the National Short Story award judges and Editor of the TLS, Stig Abell said of Persaud’s work: “ ̽��ֱ��judges were unanimous in their praise for a story which keeps a consistency of voice without smoothing over the reality of genuine conflict. ̽��ֱ��relationship between Victor and Reggie, estranged father and son, who find solace in chocolate, is an utterly convincing and memorable one, a clever inversion of normal parental process.”

Dr Sarah Dillon, ̽��ֱ�� Lecturer in Cambridge’s Faculty of English said: “Many congratulations to Ingrid Persaud on winning, and with such a beautiful story. It was a pleasure to host the award ceremony at the ̽��ֱ�� and to celebrate all the shortlisted writers amongst the stacks in the ̽��ֱ�� Library.

“We hope that this is the beginning of an ongoing relationship between the writers and our students, especially those honing their craft at the ̽��ֱ��'s Centre for Creative Writing."

Davina’s winning story was inspired by her early life living in Africa and her passion for the environment, Her story was praised by author and judge William Sutcliffe as a ‘superlative piece of writing by any measure, regardless of the age of the writer’ and by fellow judge and actress Carrie Hope Fletcher, for its ‘compassion and intelligence’.

Citing Michael Morpurgo as an influence on her writing style and having recently read a lot of post-colonial literature including Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and Anthills of the Savannah, Davina Bacon’s winning story is inspired by her earlier years spent living in Malawi.

She said: “My story is based on Kasunga National Park where they have issues with poachers crossing the border from Zambia to kill elephants. ̽��ֱ��population has decreased rapidly and this is very worrying.”

‘Under a Deep Blue Sky’ available to read and listen to on the Radio 1 website, read by Don Gilet of the BBC Radio Drama Company. An interview with Davina will be available on the Life Hacks podcast from Sunday 7 October. Davina will also receive a personalised mentoring session with an author to enhance and further develop her writing skills.

Meanwhile, ‘ ̽��ֱ��Sweet Sop’ is available to listen to at www.bbc.co.uk/nssa, read by Leemore Marrett Junior.

Added Dr Dillon: “Congratulations to Davina Bacon on winning the 2018 BBC Young Writers' Award with First Story and Cambridge ̽��ֱ��. To capture in just 1,000 words a character's present, past, and perilous future is a feat for any writer, let alone one 17 years of age. Stories like this show just how powerful this form can be - hitting you hard and fast, haunting you for long after.”

This is the fourth year of the BBC Young Writers’ Award which invites 14 – 18 year olds to submit stories of up to 1,000 words. ̽��ֱ��award was launched as part of the tenth anniversary celebrations of the BBC National Short Story Award and aims to inspire and encourage the next generation of writers.

All five shortlisted writers spent the day of the award ceremony at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� where they met Young Writers’ Award judge and fifth laureate na nÓg (Ireland's laureate for children's literature) Sarah Crossan for a writing workshop in Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library.

They were also given a private tour of ‘Virginia Woolf: An exhibition inspired by her writings’ at the Fitzwilliam Museum before attending the live award ceremony.

Trinidadian writer Ingrid Persaud, has won the thirteenth BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� for ‘ ̽��ֱ��Sweet Sop’, her first short story about a young Trinidadian man reunited with his absent father via the power of chocolate.

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̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge supports BBC Short Story Awards

ps748 — Wed, 27 Sep 2017 23:15:00 +0000

These awards highlight the BBC’s commitment to the short story form and to bringing it to a wider audience. ̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge will support all three of the awards and the charity, First Story, will become a partner for the BBC Young Writers’ Award and the Student Critics' Award. ̽��ֱ��partners replace BookTrust who have been working as a partner with the BBC since 2006.

Dr Sarah Dillon, lecturer in English Literature and Film at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, said

‘ ̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge has a rich heritage of investigating storytelling for eight hundred years and in that time we have produced many acclaimed creative writers including those who excel at the short story form such as A.S. Byatt, Helen Oyeyemi and Zadie Smith. ̽��ֱ��BBC shares more stories with more people than any other organisation in the world, and both organisations have an outstanding reputation for excellence and literary merit. ̽��ֱ��combined strengths of Cambridge and the BBC with First Story will make this a powerful and productive partnership.”

̽��ֱ��new partnership heralds an expanded programme of activity around the awards. A short story symposium will be hosted by the new ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge Centre for Creative Writing at Madingley Hall, the Institute of Continuing Education’s campus. ̽��ֱ��symposium is aimed at new writers and anyone interested in short stories and creative writing and will include writing workshops and talks by established authors. Cambridge will host the 2018 prizegiving, with a special short story edition of the BBC Radio 4 programme Front Row which will be broadcast live from the ̽��ֱ�� Library. ̽��ֱ��Cambridge School of Arts and Humanities will also host First Story’s Young Writers’ Festival for 600 young people in 2018.

Bob Shennan, Director of BBC Radio, said:

“I’d like to warmly welcome both of our new partners as we continue to champion brilliant storytelling across the BBC, including these awards on Radio 1 and Radio 4. We are the biggest commissioner of short stories and these awards are very much part of our commitment to bring our listeners the best new writing both from established and emerging talent. We greatly appreciate the support of our new partners, and I’d also like to thank BookTrust for their work with us over the past decade.”

̽��ֱ��BBC Young Writers’ Award and the BBC Student Critics’ Award enhance the offering for young people, with the aim of inspiring the next generation of readers and writers of short stories. Entrants to the Young Writers’ Award will have the opportunity to write their own short stories inspired by a treasure trove of literary artefacts, as the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Library opens up its digital archives for writing prompts. Through the Student Critics’ Award selected 16–18 year olds around the UK will read, listen to, discuss and critique the five stories shortlisted for the NSSA and have their say. They will have access to discussion guides and teaching resources created with BBC Learning, and in-school events with writers, judges, First Story networks, and staff and students from the Faculty of English at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

Di Speirs, Books Editor for BBC Radio said: “ ̽��ֱ��launch of our new three-way partnership with the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and First Story is a hugely exciting moment. ̽��ֱ��BBC National Short Story Award and the BBC Young Writers’ Award have made a genuine difference to individual writers and to the literary landscape over the past twelve years. ̽��ֱ��Student Critics’ Award will foster a new generation of readers alongside our exciting plans for writers of all ages. We share with our partners a commitment to inspiring new writers and readers and to championing the very best short story writing in the UK.”

̽��ֱ��prizes for both the BBC National Short Story Award and the BBC Young Writers’ Award remain the same. ̽��ֱ��five writers shortlisted for the BBC NSSA will all be celebrated individually on Radio 4: as in previous years, the stories will be read on Radio4 and the authors will be interviewed on Front Row, followed by a live edition of the programme where the winner is announced. For the Young Writers’ Award, the shortlist will have their stories published on the BBC Radio 1 website and the winning story will be broadcast on Radio 1. ̽��ֱ��awards will open for entry in December 2017.

A creative writing course at the Institute of Continuing Education

̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge Centre for Creative Writing offers a wide range of part-time and short courses, from one-day classes right up to a part-time Master’s degree. Students from all backgrounds and levels of experience can take part. For more information about the Centre go to: www.ice.cam.ac.uk/centre-creative-writing

More information about the Awards can be found at: www.bbc.co.uk/nssa

̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge is partnering with BBC Radio to promote the BBC National Short Story Award, the BBC Young Writers’ Award and the BBC Student Critics’ Award in a three year collaboration starting in 2018.

̽��ֱ��launch of our new three-way partnership with the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and First Choice is a hugely exciting moment

Di Speirs, BBC

Writing example

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Opinion: How to write a best-selling novel

Anonymous — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 09:33:53 +0000

So you want to write a novel? Of course you do. Everyone wants to write a novel at some stage in their lives. While you’re at it, why not make it a popular bestseller? Who wants to write an unpopular worstseller? Therefore, make it a thriller. It worked for Ian Fleming and Frederick Forsyth …

Every now and then I come across excellent advice for the apprentice writer. There was a fine recent article, for example, in ̽��ֱ��Big Thrill (the house magazine of International Thriller Writers) on “how to lift the saggy middle” of a story. Like baking a cake. And then there is Eden Sharp’s ̽��ֱ��Thriller Formula, her step-by-step would-be writer’s self-help manual, drawing on both classic books and movies. I felt after reading it that I really ought to be able to put theory into practice (as she does in ̽��ֱ��Breaks).

But then I thought: why not go straight to the source? Just ask a “New York Times No. 1 bestseller” writer how it’s done. So, as I have recounted here before, I knocked on Lee Child’s door in Manhattan. For the benefit of the lucky Child-virgins who have yet to read the first sentence of his first novel (“I was arrested in Eno’s Diner”), Child, born in Coventry, is the author of the globally huge Jack Reacher series, featuring an XXL ex-army MP drifter vigilante.

It is a golden rule among members of the Magic Circle that, when asked: “How did you do that?”, magicians must do no more than smile mysteriously. Child helpfully twitched aside the curtain and revealed all. Mainly because he wanted to know himself how he did it. He wasn’t quite sure. He only took up writing because he got sacked from Granada TV. Now he has completed 20 novels with another one on the way. And has a Renoir and an Andy Warhol on the wall. Windows looking out over Central Park. Grammar school boy done well.

Cigarettes and coffee

He swears by large amounts of coffee (up to 30 cups, black, per day) and cigarettes (one pack of Camels, maybe two). Supplemented by an occasional pipe (filled with marijuana). “Your main problem is going to be involuntary inhalation,” he said, as I settled down to watch him write, looking over his shoulder, perched on a psychoanalyst’s couch a couple of yards behind him.

Lee Child and Andy Martin in NYC. Jessica Lehrman, Author provided

Which was about one yard away from total insanity for both of us.

Especially given that I stuck around for about the next nine months as he wrote Make Me: from the first word (“Moving”) through to the last (“needle”), with occasional breathers. A bizarre experiment, I guess, a “howdunnit”, although Child did say he would like to do it all again, possibly on the 50th book.

Maybe I shouldn’t be giving this away for free, but, beyond all the caffeine and nicotine, I think there actually is a magic formula. For a long while I thought it could be summed up in two words: sublime confidence. “This is not the first draft”, Child said, right at the outset, striking a Reacher-like note. “It’s the only draft!”

Don’t plan, don’t map it all out in advance, be spontaneous, instinctive. Enjoy the vast emptiness of the blank page. It will fill. Child compares starting a new book to falling off a cliff. You just have to have faith that there will be a soft landing. Child calls this methodology his patented “clueless” approach.

Look Ma, I’m a writer

To be fair, not all successful writers work like this. Ian Rankin, for one (in his case I relied on conventional channels of communication rather than breaking into his house and staring at him intently for long periods) goes through three or four drafts before he is happy – and makes several pages of notes too.

Ian Rankin, creator of Inspector Rebus. Mosman Library, CC BY

And yet, with his Rebus series set in Edinburgh, Rankin has produced as many bestsellers as Child. Rebus also demonstrates that your hero does not necessarily have to be 6’5” with biceps the size of Popeye’s. And can be past retiring age too, as per the most recent Even Dogs in the Wild.

Child has a few key pointers for the would-be author: “Write the fast stuff slow and the slow stuff fast.” And: “Ask a question you can’t answer.” Rankin also advises: “No digressions, no lengthy and flowery descriptions.” He has a style, and recurrent “tropes”, but no “system”. And Child is similarly sceptical about Elmore Leonard’s “10 rules of writing”. “‘Never use an adverb’? Never is an adverb!” And what about Leonard’s scorn for starting with the weather? “What if it really is a dark and stormy night? What am I supposed to do, lie?”

Elmore Leonard at the Peabody Awards. Peabody Awards, CC BY

Child never disses other writers. OK, almost never (there is one he wants to challenge to unarmed combat). But he is dismissive of a certain writerly attitude, a self-conscious mentality which he summarises as follows: “Hey, Ma, look – I’m writing!” And here we come close to the secret, the magic potion that if you could bottle it would be worth a fortune in book sales. Do the opposite. If you want to be a writer, the secret is: don’t be a writer. Try and forget you are writing (difficult, I know).

This is why both Child and Rankin speak with such reverence for the narrative “voice”. And why both privilege dialogue. ̽��ֱ��successful writer is a throwback to a vast, lost, oral tradition, pre-Homer. Another thing, fast-forwarding, they share in common: the default alter ego is rock star. It’s all about the vibe. Everything has to sound good when you read it aloud.

Art is theft

But if you seriously want to be a writer, think like a reader. Child explained this to me the other day in relation to his novel, Gone Tomorrow, set in New York, which is now often used to teach creative writing. “I introduce this beautiful mysterious woman. I started out thinking: I want my hero to go to bed with her. And then I thought: hold on, isn’t the reader going to be asking: ‘What if she is … bad?’” A small but crucial tweak: one letter – from bed to bad.

“So!“ you might well conclude, “isn’t this bloke like one of those con men who offer to show you how to make a fortune (for a modest outlay) and you think: ‘Well, why don’t you do it then?'” Fair comment. Which is why I am starting a novel right now about an upstart fan who tricks his way into a successful writer’s apartment and steals all his best ideas. I don’t know why, it just came to me in a flash of inspiration. Maybe that, in a word, is the core of all great art: theft.

Andy Martin in conversation with Lee Child is part of the Cambridge Literary Festival on April 14.

Andy Martin, Lecturer, Department of French, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

This article was originally published on ̽��ֱ��Conversation. Read the original article.

̽��ֱ��opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual author(s) and do not represent the views of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

Andy Martin (Department of French) discusses the "magic potion" for writing a thriller.

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Opinion: ̽��ֱ��man with no plot: how I watched Lee Child write a Jack Reacher novel

Anonymous — Mon, 30 Nov 2015 01:00:10 +0000

Andy Martin spent much of the past year with author Lee Child as he wrote the 20th novel in his Jack Reacher series. Here he describes Child’s bold approach to writing.

Nobody really believes him when he says it. And in the end I guess it is unprovable. But I can put my hand on heart and say, having been there, and watched him at work, that Lee Child is fundamentally clueless when he starts writing. He really is. He has no idea what he is doing or where he is going. And the odd thing is he likes it that way. ̽��ֱ��question is: Why? I mean, most of us like to have some kind of idea where we are heading, roughly, a hypothesis at least to guide us, even if we are not sticking maps on the wall and suchlike. Whereas he, in contrast, embraces the feeling of just falling off a cliff into the void and relying on some kind of miraculous soft landing.

Of course he is not totally tabula rasa. Because he, and I, had a fair idea that the name Jack Reacher was going to come up somewhere in this, his 20th novel in the series.

It’s probably a defensive reflex gesture, but I sometimes like to joke that, when I had this crazy idea of writing a book about a novelist working on a story from beginning to end, I first contacted Amis/Tartt/Franzen/Houellebecq and when they were unavailable I only asked Lee Child as a desperate last resort. ̽��ֱ��reality is he was the first writer I thought of. He has always struck me as a blessed (and I don’t mean by that successful) and exemplary incarnation of what Borges called “the spirit of literature”. He is, more than anyone I can think of, a pure writer, with a degree zero style. Maybe sub-zero. He doesn’t plan. He doesn’t premeditate. He loves to be spontaneous. Which explains two things: One: that he said yes to my proposal. “I’m starting Monday”, he wrote, “so if you want to do this you’d better get over here.” And, two: that he also said: “I have no plot and no title. Nothing.”

When I got there, on September 1 of last year, to his apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, overlooking Central Park, just up the street from where John Lennon once lived (and where he was shot dead by a deranged fan), all he had was sublime confidence. And a title, which he had come up with the night before: Make Me. He just liked the sound of it.

Pencilled in

It had to be September 1. It’s a ritual with him: 20 years to the day since he went out and bought the paper and a pencil with which to write his first novel, Killing Floor. (It had to be a pencil: he decided he couldn’t really afford anything better, having just been sacked from his job in television). When he sat down to write the first sentence, all he had in his head was a scene, a glimpse of a scene: a bunch of guys are burying someone, a big guy, using a backhoe (or JCB). He had no idea who they are, why they are doing this, or who the big guy is either, other than that his name is Keever.

So he wrote the following sentence: “Moving a guy as big as Keever wasn’t easy.” I was looking over his shoulder, but I was about a couple of yards or so behind him, perched on a couch, so I had to peer hard at the screen. All I could make out was the “-ing”. It was enough for me. Good start I thought: participle, verb, action. I had to know more. But he didn’t know more, at this point. We discussed the first couple of pages, when they popped up out of his printer. He knew it had to be third-person. No dialogue, but he tried to capture something of the vernacular in a Flaubertian style indirect libre. And Reacher, when he gets off the train in the small town of Mother’s Rest, in the midst of “nothingness”, has no absolutely no idea what is going on.

Which was exactly how Lee Child felt. For the next few months I looked on with a degree of anxiety. Maybe he would never finish this one. ̽��ֱ��whole project looked doomed. Reacher was wandering around this small town, trying to work out mainly why it was even called Mother’s Rest. He didn’t even know that Keever was a dead man at this point. He was a fairly useless detective, because he couldn’t even figure out what the crime was, let alone solve it.

Wandering spirit

So too Lee Child. He wandered around New York, then drifted off to the West Coast, then Madrid, then Sussex, and still had no idea what the hell was going on in his book. If it was a book. Around Christmas time I spoke to him on the phone and he said: “Maybe it’ll make a good short story.” And added: “Maybe I should go back and work in television. I hear it’s improved a lot since my day.” And tossed in stray remarks like: “I guess I’m all out of gas.” He was partly winding me up of course – if he didn’t finish then neither would I. But after Phase One in his writing (what he calls “the gorgeous feeling” of the beginning) there is a Phase Two, which puts him in mind of Sisyphus and his travails. He struggles and meanders. Smokes more and drinks more black coffee, if it is possible to drink more black coffee. Puffs on the occasional joint in hope of inspiration finally striking.

Some time in January, it started to crystallise in his mind and he gave me the Big Reveal. Looking back at my notes, I see that I said to him, in a tone of mixed awe and horror: “You evil mastermind bastard.” I realised that there was a simple mistake I had been making all along. I had been mixing him up with his hero Jack Reacher. Whereas I now realised what I should have realised long before that he was also every single bad guy he had ever dreamed up. All those fiendish plots were actually his. ̽��ֱ��role of Reacher was to stop him plotting and for all I know taking over the world. Reacher keeps the author in check.

‘He stopped, so I stopped’

Then, in his phrase, it was the “marathon sprint” to the end. He got to the final page on April 10, 2015, surviving on a diet of Sugar Smacks and Alpen and toast, garnished with mucho caffeine and nicotine.

̽��ֱ��finished product: Make Me Random House

Having feared he would never get to the end, I was not sure I really wanted him to finish. Or whether I should be there to watch. It really seemed as if I was transgressing and crossing the line into some sacred place. I was bearing witness to the creative process dying. But without which the book itself could never be born. Last word: “needle”. “Moving … needle”. ̽��ֱ��whole book was there.

He stopped, so I stopped. That was the rule. I started when he started, so I had to finish when he did, or the day after anyway. No additions, no time for further reflection. It all had to be done according to the same principle he had adopted. Even before he had written the first sentence, he turned to me and said: “This is not the first draft, you know”. “Oh - what is it then?” I asked naively. “It’s the ONLY DRAFT!” he replied, with definite upper case or at least italics in his voice. He didn’t want to change anything, so neither could I.

Hence it took me several months to work out why it was that he worked in this fundamentally terrifying, angst-inducing way. Actually several explanations have occurred to me: sloth for one. He just can’t be bothered. And then there is what he says, which is that he would be “bored” if he knew what was coming next. But contained in that statement is a hint of what I think is the case and in fact is the secret of his whole writing.

Made man: Andy Martin’s meta-novel. Random House

Lee Child writes his books as if he were the reader not the writer. When he is sitting at his desk in that back room in Manhattan he is only typing. ̽��ֱ��real work takes place when he is “dreaming”, when he is being just another reader, wondering what is coming next, waiting to find out. It probably explains too why he allowed me to look over his shoulder and watch his sentences taking shape even before he knew how they would end. He feels a natural sympathy with readers because he is one.

I sometimes like to claim - with absurd grandiloquence - that my book is some kind of first in the history of mankind, sitting around watching another guy write a whole book: but in fact that would be a lie, because I had to run off from time to time so as not to curl up and die of involuntary inhalation. But the “first” that I really would like to lay claim to is this: I am the first reader of a Lee Child novel to read it slowly. I had to keep stopping because he kept stopping. Because he really had no idea what was coming next. “Why did you stop there?” I asked him one day, feeling he hadn’t really written enough for that day. “I had to stop there,” he said. “I have no idea who that guy in the Cadillac is.”

Andy Martin, Lecturer, Department of French, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

This article was originally published on ̽��ֱ��Conversation. Read the original article.

̽��ֱ��opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual author(s) and do not represent the views of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

Andy Martin (Department of French) discusses the year he spent sitting behind author Lee Child as he wrote the latest Jack Reacher novel.

Wikimedia Commons / Mark Coggins

Lee Child at Bouchercon XLI, 2010

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Cambridge launches first Creative Writing degree

sjr81 — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 15:44:05 +0000

̽��ֱ��two-year, part-time course, run by the Institute of Continuing Education and developed in conjunction with the Faculty of English, begins in October 2013 with applications for entry closing at the end of this month (March).

But rather than focusing purely on fiction and creative non-fiction, the MSt in Creative Writing will also take in political speechwriting, radio essays, stand-up comedy and polyphonic scripts for stage, screen and radio.

Students will also learn the art of the short story, flash fiction, writing for children, as well as poetry, literary non-fiction, criticism, reviews, and travel writing in the first year of study.

Guest speakers are likely to include Wendy Cope, Michael Holroyd and comedian Stewart Lee.

Dr Burton said: “ ̽��ֱ��MSt has been carefully designed to fit around people’s busy lives with intensive residential study pods strategically placed across the two years to enable the fullest participation. ̽��ֱ��first year will cover a wide range of genres and styles to encourage our writers to develop versatility through experimentation with new forms – while there is the chance to focus on a specialist strength, under expert supervision, in their second year.

“Writing for children is often neglected and this course is unique in offering a relationship with a local school where ideas can be developed and workshopped with a live audience.”

Successful applicants to the course will become members of one of three Cambridge colleges (Wolfson, St Edmund’s and Lucy Cavendish) and will join the wider graduate community with full access to the facilities of the ̽��ֱ��.

Dr David Frost, Tutor for Part-Time Students at Wolfson College, said: “I am very excited at the prospect of Creative Writing students becoming members of our college. We are already a vibrant postgraduate community which includes professionals such as journalists, lawyers, teachers, doctors and architects as well as researchers in the arts and the sciences. We would really love to add writers to this mix.”

Another unusual feature of the course is that in the first year critical writing is formally assessed, but creative writing is not.

Added Dr Burton: “Extensive feedback will be given on creative writing, but we are removing the pressures of formal marking, freeing students to allow themselves to develop and extend their skills by having permission to experiment, rather than fall back on what they already do well. This encourages ambitious and original, rather than conservative and ‘safe’, writing.”

̽��ֱ��course tutors and guest speakers are all established literary professionals. Year one consists of four modules, which take place in October, December, February and June: Finding Voices, Writing for Readers, Writing for Performance and Non-fiction. A four-day residency of intensive workshops, seminars and lectures forms the core of each module.

̽��ֱ��second year of study, in which students work more independently on their chosen genre, features two more short residential sessions at Madingley Hall and students will write a thesis in the form of a portfolio of creative and critical writing.

“ ̽��ֱ��question of whether you can teach anyone to write is a valid one, and of course you can’t make anyone a writer,” Dr Burton added. “However, you can nurture raw talent, help nascent writers find their own voices and offer the sort of advice and counsel that writers have historically offered each other informally (Charles Lamb’s advice to Coleridge to ‘cultivate simplicity’ is a great example) in a structured and methodical way. There are more efficient routes to improving your writing than trying to work out, all on your own, how to create certain effects. But it’s by no means a science. There is always an element of writing that is almost inexplicable – that’s the magical element that can’t be taught – that’s what the student brings.”

Further details on course fees, entry and visa requirements are available at the ICE website.

̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s first Master of Studies (MSt) in Creative Writing will explore the art of writing in all its many forms and guises, not just novel writing, according to Course Director Dr Sarah Burton.

There is always an element of writing that is almost inexplicable – that’s the magical element that can’t be taught – that’s what the student brings.

Sarah Burton

words words words by Chris Blakeley

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