Excellence in English Creative Writing Workshops

In 2019, I was invited to deliver a series of creative writing workshops as part of St Cuthbert’s Catholic High School Excellence in English programme. For each of these I developed bespoke presentations and handouts (reviewed by the teacher before delivery), using words, images, writing samples and audio clips as prompts to inspire participants:

Text reads: Choose a picture - What kind of person do you think this is? What are their motives? How do you think they speak?

Below the text are three images - an astronaut whose face cannot be seen inside the suit, a frowning woman dressed in practical clothes in front of a ruined city, and a knight on horseback staring off into the distance as if contemplating a quest.

Text reads: Choose a picture - What kind of story might take place here? What kind of character might be there, and how many?

Below the text are four images - a futuristic cityscape covered in neon adverts, a shack in a snow-covered wilderness beneath a starry sky, a painting of a huge galleon ship with many large sails, and an illustration of a futuristic restaurant in which many people are sitting and talking with a view of a forest outside.

The main goal was to encourage young people to try their hand at writing and experiment with different forms. Many young creatives can be discouraged at an early stage if they have no forum in which to share their work and receive feedback and encouragement, or if their concept of writing is limited to just the novel. I addressed this by dedicating time in each workshop for feedback and positive reinforcement, as well as sharing excerpts from my own poetry and short fiction, and talking about my own creative journey.

As these workshops also formed a part of St Cuthbert’s academic Gifted & Talented initiative, I was also encouraged to help the students inform their choice of study/career path by introducing simple analytical concepts common in the study of English Literature. For example: the second workshop focused on the concepts of ‘genre’ and ‘setting’, so I began by presenting the opening lines from several novels. For example:

Text reads: "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

What does this line tell us about the story? Do you think it is set in the same world as ours? What questions do you have about the story? Does it make you curious to read more?

Text reads: Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy (1879). A novel that tells the story of a Russian aristocrat and her affair with a rich count, that explores many different social themes. It begins by describing a marriage in crisis that foreshadows the main character's own turbulent lovelife.

To the right of the text is the cover image of the novel, which pictures a woman in white reclining on a chair.

After each one, I asked the participants to consider questions like ‘what does this line tell us about the story?’, ‘do you think it is set in the same world as ours?’, ‘what questions do you have about the story?’ and ‘does it make you curious to read more?’. Then, I invited the group to revisit something they had written in the previous workshop and pay special attention to the first sentence. Now that they know what happens later in their piece, do the opening lines create the right tone and expectations? In this way, I aimed to cultivate analytical skills that would serve the participants as both writers and readers.

My favorite workshop in the series was the final one – having worked with these students over several weeks, I learned that science-fiction was popular with the group, and we worked together to create a shared fictional world they could use. That world became Earth Station One: a science-fiction setting in which humanity has fled onto a space station from an unknown catastrophe. This allowed for stories taking place on the station itself, but also on the abandoned Earth and the wider galaxy.

In this final workshop, I shared a short story I had written to introduce the world (as well as serve as a potential framing device for works set in this universe, should they wish to use it). The rest of the workshop was spent brainstorming and writing works of short fiction set in the Earth Station One universe:

Text reads: Earth Station One

Below the text is an image of three figures looking down at the Earth through the viewing platform of a space station.

Text reads: 1/3 - Dear Researcher,
Many a history book published in the 31st century would have you believe that humanity’s expansion into space was motivated by the desire for knowledge. That was not the case.
Certainly, much was learned: inhabitable planets were found, new sources of energy were discovered and alien races were encountered. Some of them were even peaceful. But as humans spread across the galaxy they were not searching, their eyes were not wide with wonder – they were fleeing.

Text reads: 2/3 - The knowledge of what we fled from is now lost to us, but we know that Earth Station One was never designed to be a city. It became one out of necessity. Now countless humans live out their whole lives working in its astral shipyard, and eating food grown in its artificial greenhouses.

Some even venture down onto the planet below, aiming to plunder the ruins, make a home for themselves, or perhaps even discover what forced us to abandon Earth all those centuries ago. Very few return.

Four separate images are grouped together. In the first, a hydroponic lab is pictured, with many crops being mass-produced. In the second, a sinister corridor is shown, with strange glowing machines to either side. In the third, there is a cave filled with luminous fungus that glows in many strange colours. In the fourth, there is a pool of water within a lush green jungle.

I was very happy with how this series of workshops went, and received enthusiastic feedback from both participating students and teachers at St Cuthbert’s. I would have loved to have spent more time with this group of highly creative young people, and if we had been given more time together, perhaps developed an Earth Station One anthology of their work.

Out of a group of 12 pupils, 10 reported that they had learned new concepts, 8 reported that they had produced work they were excited to develop further, and all 12 said that they had enjoyed the workshops and wanted to write more in the future.

I am excited to build upon this success and the workshops I delivered for Edinburgh University Creative Writing Society. Every writing workshop I have hosted has taught me something new as a writer, and helped me produce new and better supplementary materials. I believe that anyone regardless of background can develop creatively through writing workshops, and I hope to bring them to wider audiences in the future!

If you would like to contract me to run a series of creative writing workshops for your organisation, my rate starts at £21.00 per hour. If you are a school or a charitable organisation, you are welcome to email me at workshop@lewisbrownpoet.com to discuss discounted rates or a free workshop.

Image Sources

The images used above are stand-ins for images used during the original free workshop series, sourced using Wikimedia Commons and Stable Diffusion.

The use of AI-generated images is due to the rights of previous images used in this workshop expiring. In future paid workshops, all images will be either public domain sourced through licensed image libraries such as Pixabay and Shutterstock.

Preview Image
My Heart in Book Form. Author: Luke Hayfield

‘Choose a Picture’ Slide 1 (Characters)
Image 1: Shenzhou Intra-Vehicular Activity space suit. Author: Hibiki Watabe
Images 2 and 3: generated with Stable Diffusion

‘Choose a Picture’ Slide 2 (Settings)
Image 1: generated with Stable Diffusion
Image 2: Aurora over an abandoned weather station. Author: Ted.ns

Image 3: Jacobsen Ship Canada, Author: Antonio Jacobsen
Image 4: Train of Tomorrow Sky View dining car, public domain image. Author: General Motors Corporation

‘Earth Station One’ Picture Slide 1
Image 1: generated with Stable Diffusion

‘Earth Station One’ Picture Slide 2
Image 1: Rinjani 1994. Author: Oliver Spalt
Images 2 and 3: generated with Stable Diffusion
Image 4: OSIRIS-REx Executes First Deep Space Maneuver (31907606906). Author: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

‘Earth Station One’ Picture Slide 3
Image 1: CDC South Aquaponics Raft Tank 1 2010-07-17. Author: Bryghtknyght
Images 2 and 3: generated with Stable Diffusion
Image 4: Jungle lake at the entrance to Puerto Princesa Subterranean River Cave, Palawan, Philippines.
Author: Vyacheslav Argenberg

Excellence in English: Creative Writing Workshops