Writing (MA)

The MA in Writing is a one-year, full-time course. It covers a range of genres and forms, and it interacts with our other postgraduate offerings in Literature and Publishing, Drama and Theatre, and Film. The course thus builds on our strengths in the teaching of writing for page and stage, screen, journalism and other media. The course is open to applicants from any disciplinary background (within and beyond Arts) and welcomes all types of writing interests. A ‘Qualifier’ option is available for potential applicants who do not have a university degree but have a suitable publications record or sufficient experience in a related creative field.

A weekly ‘Writers Seminar’ features writers, publishers, agents and other visitors from the writing professions. Galway’s Cúirt literary festival is the focus of April. Students attend events and complete a related assessment.

Students must take six modules in total. The Writers' Seminar is compulsory, students may then take any five of the following modules—two from one semester and three from the other:  

• Poetry Workshop. Students produce drafts sometimes in response to prompts or assignments from the workshop leader(s). These drafts are sometimes circulated for class discussion, with a view to improvement. By the end of the semester, students produce a number of complete poems and the class publishes a chapbook.  
• Fiction Workshop. Students examine elements of craft in published writers selected by the workshop leader. They also produce short pieces of fiction, sometimes in response to a prompt or assignment. Drafts may be discussed in class, or in conference with the teacher. By the end of the semester, students submit a set number of words of fictional narrative.  
• Non-Fiction Workshop. For a month students complete weekly writing assignments in elements of narrative (description, dialogue, etc.), then an essay or book proposal, which is next week by week undertaken in steps. Class meetings are devoted primarily to discussion of works-in-progress.  
• Feature-writing and Crime-reporting. Students practice the craft of feature-writing, book reviewing, and reporting. By the end of the semester, each student submits one major investigative piece of journalism.    

Students from the MA in Writing may also take a number of courses offered on the MA in Drama & Theatre Studies (MADT) and the MA in Literature & Publishing (MALP) programmes: -

• Reviewing Irish Theatre: MA in Drama and Theatre Studies (MADT)
• Playwright's workshop (places limited) (MADT)
• Discovering the Archives (MADT)
• Irish Playwrights since the 60s (MADT)
• Theatre as a Creative Industry (MADT)
• Book History  (places limited) (MALP)
• Playwright's Workshop II: Adaptation (places limited) (MADT)
• Contemporary Publishing
• Copy Editing and Proofreading
• Theatre and Globalization
• Textual Studies (MALP)
• Interpreting History 
• Studies in Oral History 
• Imaginative Responses 2