During National Storytelling Week, 30 January – 5 February, we are celebrating the incredible storytelling talents within our University community. Novelists, biographers, poets, playwrights and actors; our academics and our students find diverse ways to tell a good yarn. Here we hear from two acclaimed writers, Naomi Booth and Claire Harman, who also teach the Creative Writing MA, MLitt and PhD courses run by the Department of English Studies.

During National Storytelling Week, 30 January – 5 February, we have been hearing from three budding writers who are currently studying for an MA in Creative Writing in the Department of English Studies.

Simon J. James is Professor of Victorian Literature in the Department of English Studies. This festive season he discusses memory in Dickens’ work, and the importance of remembering past versions of ourselves at Christmas.

This Halloween, Dr Naomi Booth, Associate Professor in the Department of English Studies and award-winning fiction writer tells us about horror writing and the Boggart, a forgotten folklore monster.

Durham’s celebrated Book Festival returns this year for another weekend in October, celebrating new writing with particular relevance to the North East. Our Department of English Studies and Durham University are thrilled to be associated with the event once again, taking pride in the roots the city has in its literature and wider culture.  

We are delighted that Professor David Lawton from our Department of English Studies has been awarded the British Academy's Sir Israel Gollancz Prize for 2022.

Our outstanding research environment and our impact on public life, community, and culture have been recognised in the Research Excellence Framework 2021.

The University is one of three founding partners in Durham’s City of Culture 2025 bid, with Durham County Council and Culture Durham. Our Executive Dean for Arts and Humanities, Professor Janet Stewart, outlines the significance of the bid, why the University is lending its support, and what the title would bring to Durham City and County.

We’re delighted to announce the publication of volume 43 of Postgraduate English, our groundbreaking journal which has been publishing worldwide early-career literature scholars since 2000.

We're delighted to have risen 8 places in this year's QS World University Rankings for English Language and Literature - up to 36th in the world.

For this year’s biennial Lumiere light festival Durham University have brought together the producers, Artichoke, and regional writing development agency New Writing North, on an exciting collaboration that will see new works from some of the UK’s leading poets light up Durham Castle. Among them is prize winning writer Kayo Chingonyi, an Assistant Professor in our Department. Here Kayo talks about his involvement and how poetry has been a central part of his life.

A new multimedia exhibition curated by Dr Louisa Uchum Egbunike commemorates the 50th anniversary of the end of the Nigeria-Biafra war (1967-1970), and examines the legacies of Biafra by showcasing works from the artistic collective Nigeria Art Society UK (NASUK).