Arvon Advanced Writing Programme
THE APPLICATION WINDOW FOR THE 2026-28 PROGRAMME IS NOW CLOSED
Arvon’s Advanced Writing Programme offers 15 writers two years of sustained engagement and the opportunity to work towards completion of a project, whether in poetry, non-fiction or fiction.
The Advanced Writing Programme consists of three residential writing weeks, three Arvon online writing weeks, six Arvon online group workshops and eight Arvon online 1-1 sessions. All of these are exclusive to the 15 Advanced Writing Programme participants and are taught by three dedicated tutors. The programme will run from September 2026 to July 2028, culminating in a graduation showcase to which industry professionals will be invited.
The three dedicated tutors for the programme are Fiona Benson (poetry), Cynan Jones (fiction), and Jessica J. Lee (non-fiction). They will work with the group as a whole for elements of the programme, and then more concentratedly with the five individuals comprising their respective genre groups.
Five places are allocated for each genre – poetry, non-fiction, fiction – with participants selected through an application process that closes on 17 April 2026 at 5pm (UK time).
Graduates of the Arvon Advanced Writing Programme will receive a Certificate of Completion and join the growing body of Arvon Advanced Writing Programme alumni.
The full course fee is £8,000, payable in four instalments. We offer three fully-funded grant places and three 50% funded grant places.
If you wish to apply for a fully-funded or half-price grant place, please indicate this in your application, providing details of eligibility in your personal statement. Grants are available to UK and Republic of Ireland residents. You can read about our criteria for grants and concessions here and in the FAQ below. Please note: competition for grant places is normally very high, so you should only apply for a grant if you cannot afford the full course fee.
Your personal statement should tell us a bit about you and your writing journey, give us some sense of the project you’d be working on, and explain why you’re interested in the programme.
See below for more information on the tutors and key dates. If you have any questions, you can contact us at awp@arvon.org.
THE APPLICATION WINDOW FOR THE 2026-28 PROGRAMME IS NOW CLOSED
How to apply
- To apply please complete the online Application Form below. If the application form is inaccessible to you, please email awp@arvon.org
- Upload a sample of the project you want to work on during the programme. Your writing sample may also contain writing from a previous similar project, if you feel that would represent you best, but it must include material from your proposed project. Please submit
- up to 5,000 words of Fiction or Creative Non-Fiction, or
- up to 10 poems
- Upload a personal statement (400-600 words) which tells us a bit about you and your writing journey, gives us some sense of the project you’d be working on, and explains why you’re interested in the programme. If you are applying for a grant, please give details of your eligibility.
Please use a standard 11 or 12 point font and upload your work in Word or PDF format.
About the tutors
Fiona Benson FRSL is the author of four poetry collections: Bright Travellers, Vertigo & Ghost, Ephemeron and, most recently, Midden Witch. All three of her first published collections were shortlisted for the T S Eliot prize, and her books have won the Forward Prize, the Seamus Heaney Prize, the Roehampton Poetry Prize and the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize. Her script Infamous Offspring written for the Belgian choreographer Wim Vandekeybus / Ultima Vez has been performed across Europe and in the US. She has also edited two books of Ukrainian war poetry in translation – We Were Here by Artur Dron (2024) and Dasein: In Defence of Presence by Yaryna Chornohuz (2025). She lives in mid-Devon with her husband and their two daughters.
Cynan Jones is an acclaimed fiction writer from the west coast of Wales. His work has appeared in over twenty countries, and in journals and magazines including Granta, Freeman’s and The New Yorker. He has also written a screenplay for the hit crime drama Hinterland, a collection of tales for children, and a number of stories for BBC Radio. He has been longlisted and shortlisted for numerous awards, and won, among other prizes, the Wales Book of the Year Fiction Prize, a Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Award, and the BBC National Short Story Award. Pulse, a collection of six stories, was published by Granta Books in November 2025.
Jessica J. Lee is a British-Canadian-Taiwanese author, environmental historian, and winner of the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction, the Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature, a Banff Mountain Book Award, the Taiwan Open Book Award, and the RBC Taylor Prize Emerging Writer Award. She is the author of three books of nature writing, Turning, Two Trees Make a Forest, and Dispersals, the children’s book A Garden Called Home, and co-editor of the essay collection Dog Hearted. She has a PhD in Environmental History and Aesthetics and was Writer-in-Residence at the Leibniz Institute for Freshwater Ecology in Berlin from 2017–2018. Jessica is the founding editor of The Willowherb Review and teaches creative writing at the University of King’s College. She lives in Berlin.
Key dates
Application window opens: 26th February 2026.
Application window closes: 5pm on the 17th April 2026. Applicants must submit a writing sample of 5k words or 10 poems, as well as a personal statement.
Online interviews: end May/first two weeks of June.
Successful applicants will be notified by late June.
First residential week: w/c 21st September 2026 at Totleigh Barton, Devon.
Two further residential weeks will take place in September 2027 and June/July 2028. Three online writing weeks will take place in February 2027, May 2027 and February 2028. In between these, there will either be an online workshop or online 1-1 tutorial in each month.
FAQs
What are the eligibility criteria for grants?
You can be considered for a full grant if you are a UK or Republic of Ireland resident and one of the following applies to you
- You claim Universal Credit, Pension Credit, Personal Independence Payment (PIP), Income Support, Working Tax Credit or Job Seekers Allowance
- You are low-waged (single household: annual income of less than £23,000 inc. tax / family household: combined annual income less than £34,500 inc. tax / if you have multiple dependants, please see here)
If you don’t qualify under these criteria, but come close to doing so, you can still apply for a full grant and explain your circumstances in your personal statement. This is even more the case for 50% grants, where other extenuating circumstances (e.g. your household income exceeds the threshold but you have substantial caring responsibilities) are taken into consideration.
If I apply for a full grant but am not selected, can I still be considered for a partial grant or a full fee place?
If you apply for a full grant but would also like to be considered for a half-grant or paying place, please indicate this in your personal statement.
Can I submit more than one application / apply in more than one genre?
Due to the anticipated high volume of applications, we are asking writers to submit only one application to the programme.
Your project may cross genre boundaries (e.g. a verse novel) and you will attend workshops with all three genre tutors during the programme, but the majority of your workshops and tutorials will be in the genre you submit in, and your application will be considered against other applications from this genre.
Do I need to be a UK resident to apply?
We welcome international participants and there is no restriction on your place of residence, as long as you are able to attend the residential courses. However, you must be a UK or Republic of Ireland resident to apply for a grant.
Where can I find out more information about Arvon’s provision for writers with access needs?
Please visit https://www.arvon.org/centres/access-information for general access information. For further questions specific to access, please email access@arvon.org.
Can I apply in an alternative format that is accessible to me?
Yes. Please email awp@arvon.org to discuss.
I need support to complete the form - what should I do?
Please email awp@arvon.org and we would be happy to help.
Can I include my name on my writing sample and personal statement?
Your name can be included on all of your materials.
Can I apply if I am a published author? Can I apply if I have never published anything?
Writers of all levels of experience are welcome to apply, whether you have already published your work or not.
Programme details
Where do the residential writing weeks take place?
The programme includes three residential weeks at each of our writing houses: Totleigh Barton, The Hurst and Lumb Bank. You can find more information about each location here:
How are the residential and online writing weeks structured?
There are three dedicated tutors on the programme, one for each genre, and the writing weeks will include a mixture of genre-only workshops and whole group workshops. All the tutors will work with the group as a whole for some parts of each week, and then more concentratedly with the 5 participants of their genre groups. For example, you might have a genre-only workshop in the morning, and a whole group workshop in the afternoon, followed by a 1-1 tutorial with your genre tutor.
In what format will participants spend time with the tutors from the other genres?
You will have workshops with each of the three tutors during the writing weeks as a whole group of your cohort of 15 writers.
What is the format of the online group workshops and 1-1 sessions?
The online workshops are two-hour online writing workshops with your dedicated genre tutor and the four other members of your genre cohort. The 1-1s are hour-long sessions between you and your dedicated tutor, in they will address your work, and progress with your project, in more granular detail
What will the industry showcase event involve?
As the programme was only launched in 2024 and our first cohort is graduating this July, our first industry showcase is not happening until then. The first showcase will take place at Somerset House in London, with a number of literary agents and publishers in attendance. Each course participant will do a short reading, and there will be an opportunity to meet and mingle with the industry professionals.