Are you looking to improve your writing?

As a former Teaching Fellow and a PhD in Philosophy, I provide elite, university-level tutoring. I have designed and facilitated reflective writing workshops at Warwick University for undergraduate students of all disciplines, and I regularly present on free writing at conferences around the world. My tutoring sessions are underpinned by my peer-reviewed academic work on free writing and my creative practice as a typewriter poet.

During our sessions, you will:

• Learn how to write on the spot

• Learn to find and develop your voice

• Learn how to move people to tears or laughter with your words.

These sessions are a chance to receive help with your ideas, feedback on your work, and advice on your creative practice, or simply to have thoughtful conversations about writing.

Unlike most writers, I have no way of faking it. I cannot use AI, edit my writings, or prepare in advance when I’m out typing; it all happens on the fly, in three minutes. It may look like magic, and many people remark that I am “gifted”, but, in truth, it took over a decade of practice and discipline. There’s a great passage from Nietzsche on this:

§163 HUH. The seriousness of craft. Speak not of gifts, or innate talents! One can name all kinds of great men who were not very gifted. But they acquired greatness, became “geniuses” (as we say) through qualities about whose lack no man aware of them likes to speak; all of them had that diligent seriousness of a craftsman, learning first to form the parts perfectly before daring to make a great whole. They took time for it, because they had more pleasure in making well something little or less important, than in the effect of a dazzling whole. For example, it is easy to prescribe how to become a good short story writer, but to do it presumes qualities which are habitually overlooked when one says, “I don’t have enough talent.” Let a person make a hundred or more drafts of short stories, none longer than two pages, yet each of a clarity such that each word in it is necessary; let him write down anecdotes each day until he learns how to find their most concise, effective form; let him be inexhaustible in collecting and depicting human types and characters; let him above all tell tales as often as possible, and listen to tales, with a sharp eye and ear for the effect on the audience; let him travel like a landscape painter and costume designer; let him excerpt from the various sciences everything that has an artistic effect if well portrayed; finally, let him contemplate the motives for the human behaviour, and disdain no hint of information about them, and be a collector of such things day and night. In this diverse exercise, let some ten years pass: and then what is created in the workshop may also be brought before the public eye.

I have not always been confident as a writer, and I still have so much to improve. There are no shortcuts. It takes time and discipline, though I find we make the best progress when we have exemplars in our lives, people who share with us the tips and tricks they picked up over the years. That’s what I can offer you: real, practical advice that is grounded in years of discipline.

One-off tutoring is £50 per hour. We will meet online, using Zoom, or in person if you live near Leamington Spa. You can purchase this by clicking the button below.

Regular tutoring is £45 to meet once a month or £40 to meet once a week. To discuss these options, please email me at typingforstrangers@gmail.com.