LeisureCourses.net – short courses & residential study breaks in great locations

Games writing demands the scene-setting skills of a playwright, the characterisation of a novelist, the attention to nuance of a poet, and the flexibility to allow your audience into your work.

A course to help you in your search for the best narrative voice for this particular story, and guide you on that steep uphill journey from rough idea and draft to arriving at your destination.

A week of provocation to develop fearless writing and encourage experimentation. Includes practical workshops by Mervyn Millar to demystify puppetry and explore the relationship between design, dialogue and staging, and workshops by Nell Leyshon that focus on finding secure dramatic structures to keep your wild visions in healthy shape.

Come to Lumb Bank, the former house of Ted Hughes and now an Arvon writing house, for a week all about writing poetry. A perfect week if you are new to poetry and looking to gain the confidence to keep writing.

Some days you think you’re a genius, other days a fraud – does that sound familiar? Writing poetry is a solitary enterprise, but you are not alone. Find out how to develop your own unique style, strengthen your work and stretch your poetry muscles in a friendly, welcoming environment with like-minded people – and come away with a sheaf of new poems.

This week we invite would-be, or already published, crime novelists to experiment with new ideas. The aim of the five days is to show that there is no set format for the crime genre, except a dedication to good storytelling.

Whether you need help to get started, or to edit and develop your work, or simply to get new ideas and inspiration, this could be the course for you

We believe that true narratives can be as gripping, as literary and as appealing to the general reader as imagined stories, and we have evolved writing techniques to reflect those standards. Explaining our methods, we will help participants enhance their own capabilities in non-fiction and provide a practical toolkit for realising them.

We will look in detail at Charles Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol’ and one of his lesser known short stories, also written especially for Christmas ‘The Haunted Man’. There is no need to read these in advance of the course, but students should bring copies of both books, available in cheap Penguin Classics.

Discover the basic skills needed to write news, features, vox pops and other articles for newsletters, magazines and newspapers from a Fleet Street professional.

This weekend course organised by Anglia Leisure Learning will unveil the essential elements of the short story and
how to put them together.

The course is suitable for French-speakers and translators of French into English, but is also suitable for poets without a second language who are interested in broadening their vision beyond the Anglo-American canon.

Durhamhill’s writing courses are back for 2014 by popular demand! 3 day residential workshops with Margaret Elphinstone & Mary Smith 12th-14th May 2014 / 6th - 8th October 2014.

Be prepared to extend your boundaries during an enjoyable week of hard work and fun in the divine surroundings of the Château and Languedoc landscape. The week includes group sessions as well as one to one tutorials with Pascale.

Durhamhill’s writing courses are back for 2014 by popular demand! 3 day residential workshops with Margaret Elphinstone & Mary Smith 12th-14th May 2014 / 6th - 8th October 2014.

This weekend is for anyone who would like to see their name in print and earn some money at the same
time. Maureen Moody’s practical workshop, covering non-fiction writing, is an inspirational introduction
to magazine journalism for adults of all ages and backgrounds.

Join us to study 20th and 21st century poetry that emerges from a philosophy of deep engagement with place, landscape and nature. The course coincides with a major exhibition of the work of poet and artist Ian Hamilton-Finlay at Cambridge gallery Kettle's Yard, and will also consider the work of Richard Long and land artists Andy Goldsworthy and David Nash.

Focus on your writing and take it in unconventional directions with the help of two gifted authors and tutors Prof. Patricia Duncker and Will Eaves

Acting as writing buddies, we will help to get your creative juices flowing, so that participants can use the rest of their week to get that precious play improved, and maybe even finished.