Nature and Travel Writing

Entry requirements

We’re looking for individuals with:

• A real passion for either the natural world and/or places and people
• A love of travel and/or nature writin
• Above all, an urge to write and be published.

Ideally you should have a first degree (for example, BA/BSc), but this is not compulsory, depending on your other experience. See our Accreditation of Prior Learning (APL) web page to learn more.

Months of entry

October

Course content

For any writer inspired by the natural world, other cultures and the power of place.

• A world-leading course in two powerful genres dealing with today’s greatest challenges.
• Offers you the skills and experiences to become a published writer of books, articles and online.
• Taught remotely and part-time over two years, to fit around your lifestyle.

Do you enjoy writing about the environment, your travels, encounters with wildlife, people and places past and present? Would you like to become a working writer, or to enrich your writing for pleasure?

Today’s writing about nature and travel welcomes all of those themes and more, and in this unique and inspiring Nature and Travel writing degree course we will look at the potential of your writing and of these dynamic genres – including where they overlap with memoir, history, culture, science, wellbeing and other genres in today’s marketplace.

Over two years of mainly evening sessions, you'll be immersed in the world of great nature and travel writing, with talks from top authors and editors, seminars from our seasoned tutors, creative friendships with your peers and an exploration of both the classics and the cutting edge in our genres.

You'll write extended pieces of up to 4,000 words, essays on critical topics, and a final Portfolio of up to 18,000 words. You'll also learn about the commercial aspects of getting published, organising writing trips, establishing an online presence and building a writer’s career.

A highlight of the course is our practical approach to becoming a working writer. This includes making actual pitches to real newspapers and magazines, based on an independent field trip which you will make in order to experience writing on the road for real.

By the end of the course, you'll be prepared to operate as a professional-quality writer in our genres. By then, many of our students have already appeared in highly respected newspapers, magazines and websites.

Our graduates have been widely published, including by Penguin Books, Bloomsbury, Granta, Bradt, National Trust and others. Their prizes have included the Stanfords New Travel Writer of the Year, BBC Countryfile’s New Nature Writer of the Year, the Nature Writing Prize for Working Class Writers, the Footnote x Counterpoints Writing Prize, and short/longlists for the Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing and the Richard Jeffries Prize.

A thread running through the course is the creative journey that each student is making, which is different for each person. We support that with a Personal Journey project that supports your individual vision for who you want to become as a writer.

Our students come from all backgrounds, ages and levels of experience and skill. Some want to build a writing career and others are happy with a life-affirming hobby. We welcome all of these and see them as contributing to the richness of our learning and writing.

The 2026-28 course begins on 22 September 2026, with a four-day, three-night in-person residential event in Bath (22-25 Sept), for which you will need to find your own accommodation. After this, it will be taught online, usually on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings, and will end in September 2027. There is no formal teaching in the months of July, August or September.