Meet our Creative Writing tutor: Dr Kieron Winn

One of our most inspiring tutors at Oxford Summer Courses is our Creative Writing tutor, Dr Kieron Winn. Kieron can often be seen during the summer months musing barefoot on the lawn, teaching in the masters garden in the sunshine at Somerville or honouring us with a poetry reading. He has twice won the University of Oxford’s most valuable literary award, the English Poem on a Sacred Subject Prize.

We asked Kieron to introduce us to his new collection of poems, The Mortal Man, and give us an insight into what he will be teaching on this summer’s course.

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Here is what Kieron had to say:

“If you’ve ever found yourself fascinated by memories of lost objects from childhood, enjoyed time-travelling in the halls of museums, been amazed by a foreign city, or felt delighted and complete in nature, The Mortal Man may be a book for you.

I like to use traditional metre and rhyme (and I try to teach the right way to handle it), partly because I think it gives the words a chance to sink into the heart and memory. I like poetry that preserves places and people, and poems that makes you laugh (I imagine the poet Seamus Heaney’s first collaboration with Eminem). Above all, I like poetry that isn’t too ironic or slight, but finds that the old high joys are as fresh as ever, like a mountain stream.

The Mortal Man, which is named after a pub in the Lake District in the north of England, is available from my website, www.kieronwinn.com, where you can read some poems and reviews, or directly from me over the summer (at a special price!).”

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