MFA in Creative Writing

As a participant on the MFA programme you will be part of a large world-class School of English, Drama and Film and will:

• be taught by experienced published writers with international reputations;
• experience and develop knowledge of the best contemporary writing;
• learn how to produce and develop new ideas for your own writing;
• gain skills in editing and revising;
• take part in workshops, seminars and one to one tutorials;
• explore the archives of some of the world’s leading writers in the Special Collections held in UCD;
• develop a portfolio of work in your own chosen genre. 

A fundamental tenet of the Creative Writing Programme at UCD is a belief in the value of learning from writers who have mastered their craft. Accordingly, the emphasis is on learning to read like writers.  Students who embark on this course will already have acquired many of the skills associated with a programme such as the MFA in Creative Writing. In addition to sharing the objectives as outlined above with the MA programme, they will have a full work in progress and will be given close individual supervision in the progress and completion of that work (50,000 words) with a view to offering it for publication at the end of the course.  Class sizes are small, so the learning environment while upbeat and in every sense enabling, is necessarily quite concentrated.  

As an indication of content, MFA students 2022-23 take the following core modules:

(Please be aware that module offerings are subject to change)

Semester 1

Semester 2 

The majority of teaching on MFA in Creative Writing is structured around two intense block teaching days and requires students to be on campus on Mondays and Wednesdays. Please bear in mind that on occasion you may be required to attend lectures/seminars/launches outside of these hours.

(Please be aware that timetables can be subject to change due to spacing and resourcing schedules).

Students on the MA and MFA come from diverse backgrounds. Some come straight from their undergraduate studies while others might have spent some years in different jobs before coming to the course to fulfil their ambition to be writers. The student group is international, and students come to UCD from many countries to pursue their writing ambitions including Ireland, the UK, US, New Zealand, India, Austria and Germany.  Most have a good deal of writing experience and wish to pursue professional careers in writing, with specialisations in novel writing/short stories or poetry. Several of our alumni have won prestigious awards.

Applicants applying for the MFA should present a clear vision of the writing project they wish to develop during the programme.  A strong portfolio should contain an outline [approx 1 page] of the novel in progress, together with the opening 25 /30 pages. In the case of a short story collection, two stories; and finally, a personal statement of reasons for taking the course and references.

The personal statement should include a short summary of your writing experience to date and any courses or workshops you have attended.  Include a brief introduction of your history as a writer and how and why you want to apply for the MFA.  What do you hope to achieve and how do you believe that the MFA will help develop as a writer? If you have been previously published or are the recipient of any literary awards, please include details of these, but bear in mind that a publication history is not required to apply.

Non-EU applicants

There are two possible scholarship streams:

UCD Global Excellence scholarships

(opens in a new window)Government of Ireland International Education Scholarships

To apply to these scholarships, applicants need to already hold an offer of a place. Please apply to the MA a minimum of 2 months (ideally 3 months) in advance of scholarship application deadlines to ensure your MA application has been processed and reviewed in time.

EU applicants and Irish immigration status/leave to remain

You may be eligible for financial support from the Irish government:

- you are an Irish, EU, EEA, UK or Swiss national or have a specific immigration status or leave to remain permission from the Department of Justice.

- have been resident in the Irish State, the EU, EEA, UK or Swiss Federation for three of the last five years. 

- our total reckonable household income falls below specific income thresholds.

See (opens in a new window)SUSI GRANT and (opens in a new window)SUSI eligibility checker.

All offer holders: Annie Fanning Memorial Scholarship (Creative Writing)

This scholarship provides a €5,000 fee bursary to the successful candidate, enabling them to pursue the MA or MFA in Creative Writing in the UCD School of English, Drama and Film. Applicants who have accepted a place on the MA programme will be invited to apply for this scholarship during the summer months in advance of commencing the programme in September. 

Many of our alumni from the MA and MFA have gone on to successful careers in writing, publishing and media.

• Disha Bose MA (2015-2016) Born and raised in India, Disha now lives in Ireland. She attended University College Dublin, where she completed a Masters in Creative Writing (2016).  Disha Bose’s debut novel Dirty Laundry, a domestic noir, is to be published by Viking Books in the UK and Commonwealth (May, '23), and by Ballantine Books in North America.
• Sonya Gildea MA (2019 - 2020)
  Winner of the John McGahern Literature Award 2021; Poetry Ireland Introductions poet
  2021/22 (selected by Seán Hewitt), winner of an Ireland Chair of Poetry Student Award
  2020; recipient of a literature Bursary Award 2021 from the Irish Arts Council and winner of
  the Cúirt International New Writer’s Award (2015). Sonya has published in Crannog; the
  Stinging Fly; the Irish Times; Tolka journal; the Cormorant Broadsheet; the Night Heron
  Barks; The Maynard journal of poetry; the commemorative anthology Hold Open the Door
  (UCD & Chicago Press 2020); the Poetry Ireland Introductions anthology This Is What You
  Mean To Me (2021); Arlen House Publishing anthology of contemporary Irish poetry
  (2022); and The Common literary journal (2022).
• Sree Sen MA (2019-2020) Published in Poetry Ireland Review, The Honest Ulsterman, Local Wonders (poetry anthology by Dedalus Press), bath magg, Crossways, nether Quarterly, Headstuff and others. She’s the winner of the UCD Maeve Binchy Travel Award 2020, recipient of Cill Rialaig Residency 2020 & Agility Award 2021 by the Arts Council of Ireland. 

• Aingeala Flannery MFA (2018-2019)
  The Amusements debut novel published by Penguin Sandycove June 2022
  Arts Council Literature Bursary 2020 and 2021
  Winner Harper's Bazaar Short Story Competition 2019

'The MFA in Creative Writing at UCD gave me the encouragement and space I needed to
focus on my writing. It was challenging and inspiring, I came away with fresh ideas and a
stronger sense of my natural writing style and the themes that excite me.  Our class stayed
in touch and it's wonderful to have that ongoing support - for the rejections as well as the
celebrations. The MFA in Creative Writing changed my life'

• Aoife Fitzpatrick MFA (2018 - 2019)
  Debut novel, The Red Bird Sings, from Virago Press, June 2023
  “I miss the MFA. Not just the notable experience and insight of its teachers, but their
  authentic interest and vital engagement. That's what makes this course special; why it can
  transform both writer and work-in-progress.“
• Liz Houchin MA (2018 - 2019)
  ‘Anatomy of a Honey girl (poems for tired women)’ published by Southword, 2021.
  Awarded Literature Bursary from Arts Council of Ireland, 2021. 
• Brendan Casey, MA (2018-2019)
  She That Lay, Silent-like, Upon Our Shore, was long-listed for the Deborah Rogers
  Foundation Award and will be published by John Murray Originals in 2023.

'The course allowed me to dedicate myself to writing in a structured nurturing environment
in which I had the time and space to develop ideas. Since graduating I have signed with
RCW literary agency in London, and the thesis I submitted in UCD went on to form the
basis of my novel.' 

• Sarah Gilmartin MFA (2018-2019)
  Her debut novel Dinner Party (Pushkin, 2021) was shortlisted for best newcomer at the
  Irish Book Awards and the Kate O’Brien Award 2022. Her stories have been published in
  The Dublin Review, New Irish Writing and The Tangerine. Her story The Wife won the
  2020 Máirtín Crawford Award at Belfast Book Festival.

• Colin Barrett won the Guardian First Fiction Prize with Young Skins [Pub. Stinging Fly Press / Jonathan Cape (UK) Grove Black Cat editions (US)] then went on to win both the Frank O'Connor International short story award and the Rooney Prize for Literature.  in 2015, Colin was nominated as one of the five under 35 honourees by the National Book Foundation in the US. His stories have appeared in Five Dials, A Public Space and The New Yorker.
• Dave Rudden is a leading writer of YA fiction and has been short-listed for the Hennessy New Writing Award and the Bath Short Story Prize. He is the author of numerous novels, most recent, The Endless King, Doctor Who: Twelve Angels Weeping: Twelve Stories of the Villains from Doctor Who, The Forever Court and Knights of the Borrowed Dark.
• Jessica Traynor won the Hennessy Emerging Poet Award and the Hennessy Writer of the Year Award in 2013 and was the recipient of the Ireland Chair of Poetry Bursary in 2014. She is the author of two collections of poetry, The Quick and Liffey Swim runner-up in the 2015 Troubadour International Poetry Prize and Liffey Swim which was nominated for the 2015 Strong/Shine Award for first collections. 
• Julie Morrissy is an Irish poet, critic, and activist. Her first collection Where, the Mile End is forthcoming in February 2019 with (opens in a new window)BookThug (Canada) and (opens in a new window)tall-lighthouse (UK & Ireland). Her debut poetry pamphlet I Am Where (Eyewear 2015) was shortlisted for Best Poetry Pamphlet in the Saboteur Awards 2016.
• Henrietta McKervey has published three novels, What Becomes Of Us [Pub. Hachette Ireland], The Heart of Everything and Violet Hill. Henrietta won both the Hennessy First Fiction Award and the UCD Maeve Binchy Travel Award in 2014. 
• Helena Nolan is a poet and short fiction writer and was selected for the 2015 Poetry Ireland Introductions Series and will read as part of the International Literature Festival in May. She won the Patrick Kavanagh Award in 2011, having come second in 2010. 
• Eamon McGuinness is from Dublin. His poetry has appeared in Poetry Ireland Review, Boyne Berries, Abridged, The Honest Ulsterman, and elsewhere. In 2017, he was featured on the Poetry Jukebox in Belfast and shortlisted for the Strokestown International Poetry Prize. His debut collection is forthcoming from Salmon Poetry.