University of East Anglia: Authors hope writing course avoids cuts

Authors who have graduated from a university's renowned creative writing course say they hope it is not affected by planned staffing cuts.

The University of East Anglia (UEA) is facing a multimillion-pound deficit and wants to reduce staff by 113, in addition to those leaving voluntarily.

Author Emma Healey says it is a "real worry" the course may be affected.

The UEA said it anticipated "very few redundancies" in the creative writing department.

The University and College Union said last week 31 of 36 cuts at the university's faculties would fall on Arts and Humanities.

Formed in 1970, UEA's creative writing course offers an MA qualification to those who complete it.

Its alumni include Ian McEwan, Girl With a Pearl Earring author Tracy Chevalier and winner of the 2017 Nobel Prize in Literature, Kazuo Ishiguro.

Ms Healey told BBC Look East: "So much of what the humanities does is to help people to expand their ideas and expand their imagination.

"It's not just the one course that you'd be worried about, it's the whole atmosphere of the university."

She said the course had created a "community of writers" in Norwich and was important in the city becoming UNESCO City of Literature in 2012.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, author and editor Erica Wagner said the course "played an enormous role in my development as a writer, in my taking myself seriously as a writer, and in finding a community of other writers".

Ms Wagner, a former literary editor of the Times, said it was "unlikely for UEA to destroy this course which is seen as a gold standard and a flagship".

But she said with the university having to make savings, there was "still a risk" to humanities and arts courses.

"Humanities are regarded in this country as something of an extra option or additional. We need an understanding of how humans interact with each other and that's what humanities do," she said.

"Also the arts are an economic powerhouse for this country."

UEA said all subject areas in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities "will be maintained" including the creative writing course.

A spokesperson said £30m savings by September were needed "in order to secure UEA's future financial stability" but "compulsory redundancies remain a last resort".