The Minor in Creative Writing at NTU is open to all students interested in exploring their creative literary talents (there is no English proficiency requirement to enroll). Students will learn the techniques necessary for crafting well-made poetry, fiction, drama, and screenplays and will be encouraged to nurture their creative and innovative abilities. The courses will comprise workshops that are devoted to literary form and technique, the exploration of contemporary trends, and will provide a forum for students to share their work and have it critiqued by other authors in an encouraging and productive environment.
Creative writing helps in the intellectual and aesthetic development of students. Each piece of writing brings together the particular and the general and is essentially a "take" on the world, allowing students to explore in a concrete way sociological, economic, historical, linguistic, and psychological verities embedded in everyday life practices. In some respects, it parallels what philosophers call a thought-experiment.
Students who write poems and stories of their own are generally more aware of, and sensitive to the finer points of how language operates. Creative writing encourages conceptual speculation. It makes legitimate the expression of emotions, reactions, opinions and intuitive judgments. These are discouraged by the protocols of academic writing but can play a huge role in the development of verbal, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and existentialist intelligence.
The English Creative Writing Minor is an excellent concentration for students planning careers in fields as diverse as education, publishing, journalism, advertising, public relations, business, the civil service, as well as encouraging the budding careers of young Singaporean and Asian writers.
In addition to grading students according to the quality of their creative and critical output, student grades in these courses will also be determined based on their participation in class discussion, their contribution to the peer-review process (which will involve lengthy written reactions to their peer's writing), and according to a final reflective essay in which they must critically reflect on their writing process and their literary influences.
Students will be required to complete 5 courses with a minimum of 15 AUs, including one Core Course and any four of the Electives listed below.
To satisfy the requirements for a Minor in Creative Writing, students must complete at least five courses with at least 15 AUs, including one required course and any four electives. The required introductory course will prepare the students for the more advanced writing courses as well as give them an idea of where their creative interests and talents lie.
I. Required Course (3 AUs)
HZ 101 Introduction to Creative Writing
(HZ101 is a compulsory course, and is a pre-requisite for all the other courses)
II. Elective Courses (4 AUs)
HZ 201 Creative Writing: Poetry
HZ 202 Creative Writing: Fiction
HZ 203 Creative Writing: Non-Fiction Prose
HZ 204 Creative Writing: Playwriting
HZ 205 Creative Writing: Screenwriting
III. Advanced Electives (4 AUs)
HZ 301 Advanced Creative Writing
HL 220 Creative Writing Workshop *
*Also eligible (existing course in the BA in English)
Course Descriptions
HZ 101 Introduction to Creative Writing
This foundational course introduces students to the major literary genres of poetry, fiction and drama and to the literary techniques essential to success in these genres (including imagery, voice, dialogue, characterization, and narration) as well as to the processes which drive creative productivity. Students will complete original assignments in each of these major genres while learning the procedure for work-shopping each other's products and the benefits of constructive criticism and revision.
HZ 201 Creative Writing: Poetry
This course will involve a more sustained exploration of the creative process involved in writing poetry. Students will be expected to complete a number of original poems in a variety of traditional and contemporary forms and styles. Much of the discussion of form and technique will be done through close examination of traditional and contemporary models with the hope that students will derive inspiration from them. In addition to critiquing each other's work, students may be asked to write a review of contemporary poetry.
HZ 202 Creative Writing: Fiction
In an effort to develop their understanding of fiction writing, students will be expected to complete several short stories. A focus on the relationship between form and content will form much of the substance of the students' work. The course will also provide practical exposure to a variety of stylistic and technical devices that are specific to the writing of fiction. This will all be formulated in the context of classical and contemporary examples.
HZ 203 Creative Writing: Non-Fiction Prose
In this course students will explore "the fourth genre"—Non-fiction Prose or Creative non-fiction. Units of this course will cover feature articles, personal essays, biographies, travel writing, nature writing, reviews, argumentative essays, opinion pieces, and research articles. Students will be expected to complete several assignments in a variety of these areas.
HZ 204 Creative Writing: Playwriting
This course will involve a more sustained introduction to the creative process involved in writing plays than was possible in Introduction to Creative Writing. Students will be expected to complete several short plays. Much of the discussion of form and technique will be done through close examination of traditional and contemporary models with the hope that students will derive inspiration from them. In addition to critiquing each other's work, students will be asked to write a review of a contemporary play or a collection of short plays.
HZ 205 Creative Writing: Screenwriting
This course will introduce students to the practical processes and considerations involved in the production of scripts for television and/or film. Students will be expected to complete several short screenplays during the course of this course, initially by mimicking some of the best international and local examples and thereafter by producing some original work.
HZ 301 Advanced Creative Writing
This course will be reserved for those students who have displayed the most talent in the earlier courses and will be subject to a B+ average across 4 previous courses. Exemptions may be granted at the lecturer’s discretion. The students who gain admission to this advanced-level course will work towards a publishable piece of creative work under the supervision of the tutor, in a genre of their choice.
HL 220 Creative Writing Workshop *
Under the supervision of one of the faculty members, established writers or theatre practitioners will be invited to conduct workshops in an appropriate genre of creative writing. This may entail a practical drama workshop involving exposure to writing, direction, and theatre craft, or it may mean a closely supervised workshop with a poet, novelist or film-maker in an attempt to learn important aspects of the craft of creative writing.