Welcome

Welcome to Winning Words – a blog featuring interviews with writers, publishers and agents and writing tips and prompts, a free forum to chat with other writers and post your work and get feedback, a deadlines page of magazines calling for submissions and writing competitions, and our 6 week online creative writing courses.

Watch out for details of more writing courses coming soon…

Past tutors on our writing courses have included: Calum Kerr, Tom Vowler, Nik Perring, Keris Stainton and Jo Bell.

Winning Words courses are delivered in weekly email ‘lessons’ containing teaching, reading and exercises. There is a designated private area of the forum for course members to chat, discuss the reading material and post drafts of the exercises, and give each other feedback, as well as interacting with the tutor.
[The small print: no refunds will be issued unless the course is cancelled by Winning Words or the course tutor. Please ensure you have basic computer proficiency before signing up!

 

 Testimonials from The Bell Jar poetry course with Jo Bell

I began the Winningwords poetry course “The Bell Jar” without any experience of having been on a poetry/writing course before. I was a bit daunted at the thought of a forum and at posting my work for others to see/comment on. However I found the forum the best part of the course. The feedback and support from the other writers was great and gave me a lot of confidence.. I also loved reading everyone else’s work which was very helpful. The tutor Jo Bell was really down to earth and honest and I felt that she understood what I was trying to do with my work. I found her comments and criticism invaluable and I feel I have progressed a lot through her feedback and the challenging exercises. All in all doing the course was a truly positive experience and one which has set me on the road to serious poetry writing. I would recommend this course to anyone, especially those who need confidence in their writing or those who would like to learn different techniques.. An excellent course.

A well structured, interesting and constructive course with a very supportive tutor. I have written more poems in the last six weeks than I usually write in a year. Thanks for a great experience.

I can’t speak highly enough of this online course. Jo Bell has produced a perfectly pitched poetry masterclass! The exercises were stimulating, the feedback constructive and excruciatingly honest.

This was an inspiring, friendly course. I think the quality of my writing really improved over the six weeks. And I loved it!

Before the course I was feeling stuck, uninspired, under-stimulated and my output was about a poem a month. During the course I was producing 3/4 poems a week, feeling supported, encouraged, stretched and incredibly stimulated. The feedback from Jo and from other people on the course was direct, honest, focused and practical. The solidarity was very real and I learnt what my strengths and weaknesses are and how best to use the skills I have and how to build new ones. Jo’s fantastic exercises were multi-faceted, combining practical techniques with encouragement to go off in any direction. I can honestly say it has been life-changing for me !