One of the major reasons I chose the MA in Professional Creative Writing at Coventry University is because of the scope it provides me with, not just in this module but in the other modules I will come to study. I enjoyed the prospect of doing this to refine my craft as a writer, to find out what type of a writer I want to be before I go out into the industry and contact editors, agents and publishers. I hope by having a clearer idea of which direction I want to go in not only as a writer but also on a personal level, I can strengthen my skill set as well as gain more confidence in my own writing, so when I contact editors, agents and publishers I can go in more efficiently and really make the novel I want to make.
Within my lectures during my first semester on the MA, I studied a ‘Genre Fiction’ module with focus on Horror, Crime Sci-fi and Fantasy. One of the highlights of the course so far was how the first module was structured. During my undergraduate study, there were times where there was too much crammed into one lecture and it made some of the information hard to retain for me to take into my writing craft. On my postgraduate degree, there was a certain focus on one genre per week before we delved deeper, learning the individual conventions and how we as writers can apply it to our own writing. It really helped me to grasp the matrices of the different genres and opened my mind to freely writing using all four of them. It also opened up new opportunities for myself to entwine them into one, stronger piece of writing.
The Coronavirus pandemic did worry me as to how the lectures would pan out and be as effective, but the online classes via zoom were both open, lively and interactive between other writers so we could help refine our own craft by brainstorming ideas and complete writers activities set to us by the lecturer. The lecturers themselves were also live on the zoom call so we all could further brainstorm our work as well as each others’. The classes felt very personal and I feel more confident in my own writing and being able to pitch effectively to others which I purposefully avoided for a fear of negativity and ridicule.
I have become a stronger writer and I am definitely on my way to refining my craft.
Sophie Creates 