Here in Scotland, storytelling is at the heart of our culture, and in Glasgow particularly, literary culture is varied and rich. Whether you’re interested in poetry, fiction, creative non-fiction, or screenwriting, we'll guide you towards telling the best story possible, in a city full of opportunity and inspiration.

Creative Writing has had a strong profile at Strathclyde for many years. Some of our students and staff have won, or been listed for, major international prizes and grants from awarding bodies including Creative Scotland, the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC); the Wyndham-Campbell Literature Prize, Dylan Thomas Prize, Somerset Maugham Prize, Authors’ Club Novel Award and the Desmond Elliot Prize (for the best first novel in the UK).

Former staff and students include:

Zoë Wicomb (South African-Scottish novelist and short story writer, author of You Can’t Get Lost in Cape Town, now Emeritus Professor)
David Kinloch (long-time Professor of Poetry at Strathclyde, David is the author of five collections of poetry published by Carcanet, including Un Tour d’Ecosse and Finger of a Frenchman)
Louise Welsh (author of The Cutting Room and many other successful crime novels)
Margaret Elphinstone (historical fiction writer, author of The Sea Road)
Andrew O'Hagan (ex-student, nominated three times for the Booker Prize, novelist and nonfiction author, also Editor at large at the London Review of Books)
James Kelman (hugely influential winner of the Book Prize for How Late it Was, How Late)
Ali Smith (multi-award-winning novelist, short story writer and essayist, author of How to Be Both and The Season Quartet)

Until recently, we had the privilege of working with novelist and dramatist, Beatrice Colin, who was a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing. Sadly, Beatrice passed away in February 2019. She was an inspirational teacher and is much missed by students and staff. An obituary by Gaynor MacFarlane, may be found here. The Beatrice Colin Prize, for the best Creative Writing Dissertation, has been set up in her name.

We combine the best creative instincts with first-hand experience in the creative industries. The world of storytelling is ever-changing, so we make sure to invite only the most relevant industry speakers from the worlds of broadcasting, publishing and digital media. We also regularly work with Glasgow’s Aye Write! Book Festival on events and creative writing workshops, as well as with other partners in the world of publishing, giving students how the real world of publishing works.

In your time with us, you'll be preparing for making a life in writing. Everyone has a story to tell. The challenge lies in learning how to tell it well.

Our areas of research

Discover more about creative writing

Lecturer

Andrew Meehan

I joined the university in 2018. I'm a novelist, screenwriter, and an experienced script executive, most notably at the Irish Film Board where, as Head of Development, I nurtured the development of numerous Irish feature-films, including the Oscar-nominated animated feature Song of the Sea; the ground-breaking comedy Good Vibrations, and the recent critical and commercial success Black 47. I was also involved as an executive on a number of Oscar nominated and shortlisted short films.

Course Convenor

Dr. Rodge Glass

The world of Creative Writing is in fact many different worlds: poetry, screenwriting, hybrid writing, fiction (in all its many forms), creative non-fiction (which is also many things, from science to nature to memoir writing), and lots of other things besides. There's plenty of rigour, but plenty of freedom too. It's my idea of a good time.

Professor Emeritus Poetry

David Kinloch

David Kinloch is Professor Emeritus Poetry at the University of Strathclyde. He is the author of the collections Un Tour d’Ecosse (2001) In My Father’s House (2005), Finger of a Frenchman (2011) and In Search of Dustie-Fute (2017), all of which are published by Carcanet. In 2004 he was a winner of the Robert Louis Stevenson Memorial Award and in 2006 held a Scottish Writers’ Bursary from the Scottish Arts Council. He was a founder editor of the poetry magazine Verse and was instrumental in setting up the first Scottish Writers’ Centre. He is the current Chair of the Edwin Morgan Trust.

Lecturer

Dr Maria Sledmere

As Lecturer in Creative Writing, I’ll bring the poetry energy to Strathclyde’s burgeoning Creative Writing department, which has recently joined up with English (happily uniting my own two subject areas!). I teach on the BA English & Creative Writing as well as the MLitt in Creative Writing. My primary specialisms are: poetry and poetics; creative nonfiction; writing that spans genres, media and form; experimental criticism and art writing; short form fiction and the novel

Lecturer

Dr Sarah Bernstein

I teach literature and creative writing and am especially interested in experimental or hybrid work, or work that engages in some way with the concept of difficulty. I write across genres and am particularly interested in the novel, short form prose, and the lyric essay.

Creative writing

Our areas of research

Poetry

Screenwriting

Contemporary fiction & non-fiction

Discover more about creative writing

Lecturer

Course Convenor

Professor Emeritus Poetry

Lecturer

Lecturer

Our faculties & departments

Our faculties & departments

Engineering

Humanities & Social Sciences

Science

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