Fay Weldon CBE, novelist and Professor of Creative Writing at Brunel University, will give the keynote speech at this one-day conference at Brunel on 6 September 2008. The conference is designed for lecturers and A-Level teachers.
The novelist Celia Brayfield, who redesigned the subject at Brunel two years ago, said, "We believe that creative writing should never have been dropped from the English curriculum. Creative practice and the academic study of literature and drama are naturally connected but at present there is a whole generation of English teachers who have missed out on the creative dimension. It's curious that a subject so central to the development of our creative economy is effectively backing into the curriculum."
Speakers include the Booker nominated novelist Tibor Fischer, who will be teaching on novel-writing MA in the coming year, and the award-winning poet Roddy Lumsden, a central figure in the teaching of poetry. Katie Waldegrave will talk about First Story, a new initiative to take writers into schools with challenging profiles, which she will launch later in the month. Also speaking will be Dr Andrew Green, senior lecturer in Education at Brunel University and author of the English Subject Centre reports, Four Perspectives on Transition - English Literature from Sixth Form to University (2005), and Teaching the Teachers: Higher Education and the Continuing Professional Development of English Teachers (2008).
"We're aiming to create a dialogue between higher education and teachers working in schools," explained Dr Green, former English teacher at Carshalton High School for Girls in South-West London and head of department at Ewell Castle School for Boys. He said he hoped that the conference would "offer inspiration and expertise to those who wish to extend their professional development as teachers of creative writing or who are approaching the discipline for the first time."
Professor Weldon said: "A great writer needs a certain personality and a natural talent for language, but there is a great deal that can be taught - how to put words together quickly and efficiently to make a point, how to be graceful and eloquent, how to convey emotion, how to build up tension, and how to create alternative worlds."
Dr Green feels that the new A levels in English would be welcomed. "School students who take English as an academic subject often wish to express their own creativity, as they are encouraged to do in the other arts A levels, Music, Art or Drama."
All events will take place in the Lecture Centre.
For directions to the campus, visit http://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/where
Full programme information.