For half a century Creative Writing has proved one of our most productive and successful areas of research. Each piece of prose fiction and creative non-fiction, each poetry collection, script or dramatic production that emerges out of our school constitutes a research project informed by historical investigation, archival study or critical interrogation.

Our work in these diverse forms repeatedly extends the boundaries whereby those forms are understood and valued. Our writers also contribute important critical studies of the creative practices in which they lead the world.

Our research is taught and developed in the classroom, making us a place where ground-breaking experimental practice and practice-based research flourish. International, national and local creative writing research is enhanced by close collaboration with the National Centre for Writing, the British Centre for Literary Translation, the British Archive for Contemporary Writing and a range of international associations. Our students doing PhDs in creative and critical writing benefit from access to a sophisticated training schedule run by active practitioners who are leaders in their fields.