Workshops, tutoring, mentoring
As a tutor and mentor, I’ve helped lots of poets develop their work, get published, and win prizes.
I can help you lift your technical knowledge, work in form, and control and tighten the content. I can also help you explore what you really want to be writing about, and increase your confidence to write it.
I’m also an editor with experience in several genres and sectors, including publication production, and a member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. I offer a manuscript service that covers critique and advice, editing, and working with writers to develop a collection of poems.
For recommendations, see what my students say.
Independent workshops
The Thursday group
Meets every other Thursday in term time: a friendly, engaged, eclectic seminar group, aimed at broadening and deepening students’ reading and critical skills. Each session meets for 2.5 hours for lots of time looking at students’ work. Intermediate/advanced. Central London.
Poetic Technique
A year-long course forged at the famous Poetry School, now offered independently. Good for people almost any stage in their writing: if you wish you knew more about how technique works in both ‘formal’ and ‘free verse’, this course is for you. It meets on Tuesday evenings in central London.
We look at metrics vs rhythm, ‘sonics’ vs ‘rhyming verse’, kinds of patterning, the difference between form and ‘formal’, ways of structuring content, and what dactyls and amphibrachs like to eat when they’re at home. Students are encouraged to write and share poems that use the techniques we’re studying. (But you don’t have to.)
You can join the course in any term; summer term begins May 7th.
Fees for both these courses are £120 a term.
To ask a question or be added to the mailing list for workshops, drop me a line.
One-to-one services
One-off feedback
I can give you a detailed line-by-line reading of an individual poem or group of poems, with specific suggestions for developing your work as a whole. I work by email or face-to-face.
Ongoing feedback & mentoring
If you’d like deeper ongoing support I can work with you over a set period, or over a set body of material. I’ll help you spot the hidden corners in your work, so you can work to your strengths and really develop your writing. I’ll give you ‘reading prescriptions’, set writing challenges, and make suggestions about opportunities to get your work out there.
Manuscript editing
If you have a manuscript you’d like an experienced eye on, I can:
- Proofread your manuscript
- Line-edit your manuscript
- Help you shape your poetry collection
- Work with you to develop a book out of the poems you have
Several published poets have used this service. Contact me to outline your project and get a quote.