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Platform discussed with him his journey from 2006 to published author of his first novel, Dodger.

What were you doing in 2006 and what was behind your decision to study A215 Creative Writing?
Back then I was working as the manager of my family's furniture retail business in Welling, Kent while studying for the OU in the evenings. It was a good job but I always regretted not getting a degree earlier so the OU provided a marvellous opportunity for me to achieve that while I was still working.

I knew I wanted to be a writer from an early age and so was looking for a way to get into it. I never would have had the confidence to start writing properly if the Open University hadn't provided me with such a great way of discovering if I would be any good at it. I had already completed a number of other level 3 modules in literature and so only needed to do one more to get my degree and I very much left the creative writing course until last as I thought it would be the most enjoyable. And it was.

What was the degree you graduated in?
I graduated with a BA Hons in Literature and got a first. The modules I had completed before I did A215 included ones on Shakespeare and the Nineteenth Century novel. These courses very much informed the work I went on to do, especially the latter as my decision to write a novel based on the continuing adventures of the Artful Dodger was inspired by the works of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins - both of whom I studied as part of my OU course.

What was the key benefit for you in taking the creative writing module?
Confidence really. Up to that point my ambitions to be a writer had not been tested in any real way and there was always a chance that I wouldn't be very good at it. But the course got me writing to deadlines and I produced a number of short stories, poems and pieces of non-fiction which I was surprisingly happy with. That year I sent off one of my short stories into a competition and came second. I also received a lot of positive feedback from my fellow students which meant a lot. Looking back at that work I can see that a lot of it was pretty rough around the edges but the realisation that it didn't completely suck strengthened my resolve to pursue it further once the module was completed.

How did it inspire you to take your writing further?
Well, it gave me the bug and I knew that I wanted to take my writing to a higher level if possible. My tutor on A215, the author Tom Lee, sent me a very encouraging email after I completed the course saying that I should consider applying for a Masters next. He gave me a very decent reference which I used to get accepted into the then very new creative writing MSt course at Oxford. And this was where I came up with the idea for Dodger.

What support did the OU give you?
The support and encouragement of my tutor was a tremendous push in the right direction but I also think that the other courses I did to get the degree provided a strong base for me to build on. Before I studied with the OU all my attempts at writing failed because I wasn't aware enough of a literary tradition and so was sort of writing blind. But by making a study of great works of literature I was able to give my own writing some context and learn from some of the masters. Not least of all Dickens.

Tell us about the inspiration behind Dodger?
I got the idea for Dodger when I was thinking about how much I enjoy the characters of Dickens in particular and how they all seem to live their own lives off the page. I've always wished that Jack Dawkins - the Artful Dodger - had been a character that Dickens returned to throughout his work and I started to imagine how much fun it would have been if he'd started cropping up in other Dickens novels as a recurring character. This gave me the idea for the first chapter in which Dodger is caught while trying to steal a silver snuff box from Mr Pickwick and I wrote the scene as part of the Oxford writing course. The rest of the book just sort of snowballed from there.

I think the book changed quite a lot throughout the three drafts that I wrote but I always knew I wanted it to be told in the first-person by Dawkins himself. I wanted his strong, unapologetic cockney dialect to provide an alternative look at the events and characters from Oliver Twist and to take the reader on a journey into his new adventures.

How was the "journey to publication" and what advice would you give to others embarking on the same?
Writing a book is one thing but getting it published is a lot tougher and requires a lot of patience. I was lucky in that I was approached by my agent after I gave a public reading from the first chapter and obviously good representation is a big step forward. But the publishing industry can be very resistant to new ideas and voices and I got a lot of rejections before I found an editor ready to take a punt.

My advice to other writers trying to get started is to do your best to get your work seen by as many people as possible. It’s important to get an agent first as publishers only take represented authors seriously as a rule and so you must make attracting a good agent your first priority. So approach them professionally, with your best work that is well-presented and that you are confident about, and hopefully you'll find someone who can get passionate about representing you. Public readings, like the one I did, are sometimes good to do if you're trying to get your work noticed and it helps to have things published in magazines and on the internet. It’s a long road to get published and it might feel as though you aren't getting anywhere. But stick with it and they can't ignore you forever.

What can you tell us about the sequel?
I'm halfway through the sequel now and it seems to be coming together pretty well. Obviously when I wrote the first one I didn't know much about the process of writing a novel but learnt as I went along. This time I feel much more experienced and I've plotted the story out in far greater detail and thought about my themes and characters a bit more deeply. Also, when I started writing book one I was essentially talking to myself. I didn't have an agent, a publisher or anything. Now I'm writing a book which I know will be published which means I'm approaching it much more professionally and producing more words a week. Hopefully the sequel will be out next year.

Anything else you may wish to say to you fellow OU alumni and current students?
Studying with the OU was literally life-changing because I ended up leaving my job in order to become a writer because of it. It really opened my mind to a wider world of literature and the benefits of this have been immeasurable.

It’s a wonderful institution and I feel really grateful to have been an OU student.

Find out more:

• Discover creative writing at the OU

Posted 1 May 2013

Tell us about your writing career so far
I have written for as long as I can remember and won a UNESCO medal when I was eighteen in 1979 for a book of poems on the Year of the Child.

I stopped writing when I went to Trinity, University of Dublin, to study English – the academic work on literature that I did for the next ten years silencing the writing side really. I took up writing again seriously in 2001 and took a three-year career break from teaching in that year and did the MA in Creative Writing in Queens.

My main work has always been teaching – English at secondary level and now Creative Writing with the OU also – and in a lot of that time as an English teacher I would see ‘gaps’ in texts – like the sixteen-year gap in the middle of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale – which I’d want to fill with story or narrative. That was one of the first projects I undertook when I started writing – to create a poem-sequence that would account for the lost years of Hermione!

How did Luscus come about?
I’ve worked mainly in poetry so far and now have a manuscript of poems that I hope to find a publisher for. I have just started to consider prose – partly because there is a strong narrative drive in the poems and I have an idea for a novel that I want to try.

The short memoir piece for the Fish is something I’ve wanted to try to write about for some time. I tend to use competitions as deadlines sometimes so that was the idea of this – to give me a date to aim to have a completed piece written by. It was something I knew I’d write at some time and I’d tried it in poetry but it didn’t work. This was my first memoir piece for print though I have written memoir pieces for radio – BBC Radio Ulster and RTE – which may have helped.

What are the rewards of teaching creative writing with the OU?
The thing I like about working with the OU is the close personal contact it affords with students through online teaching. If it works well it is a very intense and personal exchange of ideas and of practice. I love being part of the journey that writing can be for students – sometimes a journey just to finding a way to telling a story that needed to be told, but also when someone discovers a facility or love for a genre that has previously been closed to them – perhaps by negative learning experiences in the past. That often happens with poetry and being able to help in those discoveries and share in that excitement is what makes the work so enjoyable. It also adds to greater self-awareness in my own writing to be doing such close reading of other writers’ work in the course. 

'I love being part of the journey that writing can be for students' 

The benefits of OU study include the wonderful resources – I think they are exemplary – and the sense of inclusiveness of the institution and its structures of support which are of a different quality than anything I’ve seen in other universities where I studied myself. I think the structure, breadth and the feedback given on A215 is in some ways better than many MA courses since it matches reading, close written feedback and workshopping possibilities.

Why study creative writing?
In my own study the main benefit was in helping to take the writing seriously and to think of yourself as a writer, which is a hard thing to do sometimes. The other great plus is the contact with other writers and the interactions with them – of support and of ideas – that is very important. You need to have some people whose advice you trust and you begin to find that by studying Creative Writing.

I’m delighted to win the Fish. It is especially lovely when you win a prize chosen by a writer whose work you admire and Molly Mc Closkey’s feedback is perhaps the best part of it for me since I thought her memoir Circles Round the Sun was hugely impressive. I think winning it may make attractive the idea of doing more work in prose – in both memoir and fiction.

Any tips for students entering writing competitions?
Find a competition which suits something you already know you have or you want to work on. Make sure the work stands outside of any reference to a competition – that you have a sense of its quality yourself. Follow the rules carefully and avoid gimmicks – present the work carefully so that it is the writing alone that is being judged.

Maureen Boyle is based in Belfast and teaches A215 Creative Writing for the OU in Ireland. Luscus will appear in the 2013 Fish Anthology to be launched at the West Cork Literary Festival in July 2013, at which she is also invited to read.

Posted 29 April 2013

Philosophy and counselling may sound like unlikely bedfellows, but they have come together in a novel form of therapy called existential counselling.

One of the leading exponents of the British school of existential counselling is Dr Darren Langdridge, head of the OU's department of Psychology. He's just published a new book, Existential Counselling and Psychotherapy.

So what is existential counselling? "It's about bringing together a particular type of philosophy – existentialism – with a particular approach to counselling and psychotherapy," says Darren.

"Existentialism is a practical philosophy which looks at how we can live better lives. In existential counselling we draw on their ideas of how to live well, and apply them to therapy."

One well-known name who was an early exponent of existential therapy was RD Laing, the 'anti-psychiatry psychiatrist'. At a time when people suffering mental distress were being heavily medicated or locked away in mental institutions, Laing argued that therapists should be trying to connect with their patients as fellow human beings.

The key principles for an existential counsellor are: to try and understand how the person you are counselling sees the world, not to impose your world view on them; and to treat them as a unique human being. "We don't treat a person for 'depression'," says Darren. "We see a person who is having a low mood but we don't approach this as though they have a pathology.

"We have a dialogue with our clients. It is very engaged and active. The point about existentialism is that it wants to change the world."

Darren says his book is an introduction to existential counselling and psychotherapy but for those who are already well-informed in the subject, it also pushes the boundaries. 

For those not so well informed, there is also an introduction to existential counselling authored by Darren in D240 Exploring fear and sadness, a course which looks at a range of therapies. 

Darren has also contributed material to DD307 Social Psychology: critical perspectives on self and others on phenomenological psychology. Phenomenology is a branch of philosophy linked to existentialism, and the phenomenological method is used to understand what the world is like from the point of view of others. 

If you want to learn more about how philosophy can inform counselling there's no need to be put off by any unfamiliar philosophical terms. These are all translated into practice in the book and course material on existential counselling, says Darren. "You don't need any background in philosophy to understand them."

Find out more

For those completely new to counselling, the OU offers a 15-point, 12-week introductory course Introduction to counselling (D171). 

BBC's Mastermind is looking for contestants now.

For more information, or to book a place on one of the nationwide auditions, visit the Mastermind website and click on Audition Information; or call 0161 836 0315; or email mastermind@bbc.co.uk

Posted 25 March 2013

This heady time is explored in America - A new world discovers its voice, a major event in The Rest is Noise festival, at London Southbank on Saturday 23 and Sunday 24 March.

The weekend of music, talks and conversations includes talks by OU Arts academics Ben Winters, Alan Sennett,and History tutor Alison Appleby on US race relations, Pearl Harbour, the Spanish Civil War, and filming the New Deal.

The OU's jazz expert Catherine Tackley will also be giving a free talk on the Blues and its Influence, in advance of the event concert on Sunday evening.

Visit the OU’s Rest is Noise on Open Learn to find out more about the weekend, including how to book tickets, and ticket offers.

Students currently studying with the OU are eligible for student concessionary rates, where available, when purchasing tickets for The Rest is Noise festival events.  

 Photo (top) shows Bessie Smith, 'Empress of the Blues'

Sean’s startling claim comes from his research into medieval records chronicling the deeds of one William of Kensham, a real-life 13th century freedom fighter also known as Willikin of the Weald.

William and his 1,000 men took to the Kentish forests in the wake of a French invasion in 1216, to harry the occupying forces with their longbows.

Sean came across William while carrying out research for his book Blood cries afar, about this little-known French invasion.

“I learned more about a band of common men dwelling as outlaws in an English forest and using their bows to fight against tyranny and oppression under the charismatic leadership of a longbow-wielding folk hero.

“Not only has this individual never been identified as a possible origin of the Robin Hood stories, he was no mythical figure but a real man of flesh and blood and a genuine English champion.”

Other candidates have been put forward as the inspiration for Robin Hood. Sean (pictured left) has analysed their claims and believes William’s is the strongest.

William would also probably have had links with Sherwood Forest and Nottingham Castle, which was effectively the headquarters of the English king’s forces.

Tales of Robin Hood stealing from the rich to give to the poor may originate from William’s raids on the French invaders to repossess pillaged English property.

“It is quite easy to envisage that when William attacked the French, their goods were returned to the local community – especially as this would encourage locals to help William,” says Sean.

William was eventually made Warden of the Seven Hundreds of the Weald, as a reward for his services to King John, and settled in Kensham, near Tunbridge Wells.

Over the centuries, tales of his exploits would have been changed in the telling, and elements from other sources added.

“If you want to find the source of the Robin Hood stories, it’s most likely to be William,” says Sean. “We don’t find anyone else who comes remotely close."

Sean’s research, first published in the March issue of History Today magazine, sparked media interest as far afield as the Times of India, the Sydney Herald and New Zealand Radio.

Posted: 19 March 2013

Useful links

• A200 Exploring history: medieval to modern 1400-1900
• Daily Telegraph: 'Robin from Kent, not Sherwood Forest, historian claims'
• History Today  

Top: Image of Robin Hood statute, Nottingham.Thinkstock

"This is wonderful news,’ said Dr Derek Neale, OU’s Chair of Advanced Creative Writing and Director of English Teaching, when he heard about the project, ‘encapsulating the aims, ideals and spirit of the course and OU CW teaching…your project offers evidence of imaginative adventure and writing output, but also testifies to the collaborative and interactive spirit of the OU writing courses."

The anthology took around nine months from the initial idea to production. After the assignments were written, the authors put them away, as writers are so often advised, to be able to see them through fresh eyes at a later date.

The editors commented that the authors have shown dedication to produce a published eBook in five weeks whilst juggling busy lives.

Find out more:

• The anthology is available from Amazon for Kindle
• Details to view non-Kindle versions

For centuries, composers created music that sang with beautiful melody and harmony. Then suddenly, just over a hundred years ago, a battle began for the very soul of music.  

The series tells the story of a revolution in sound as avant-garde composers broke from the melodic mainstream.

Tonight's episode
Tonight’s episode at 9.00pm  looks at the shift in the language and sound of music from the beautiful melodies and harmonies of the giants of classical music such as Mozart, Haydn and Brahms into the fragmented, abstract, discordant sound of the most radical composers of the new century – Schoenberg, Webern, Stravinsky among others.

Following episodes
Following episodes look at how the freewheeling modernism that had shocked, scandalised and titillated audiences in the twentieth century’s first two decades then came under state control. Arguably the most notorious work of 20th century classical music, John Cage’s ‘silent’ composition 4’33”, is examined.

OpenLearn
There's extensive content on OpenLearn in connection with the series subject areas including a new interactive called 20th Century Composers: making the connections, as well as information about hundreds of concerts and events taking place at London’s Southbank Centre in the year-long festival The Rest is Noise, in partnership with the OU.

Find out more on OpenLearn.