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The University of East Anglia is situated at
Earlham on the western edge of
Norwich. It was designed by
the architect Denys Lasdun in the Brutalist (concrete
monstrosity) style and constructed between 1962 and
1972. Its 'ziggurat' halls of residence are particularly
distinctive and can be seen to best advantage from the
university lake.
UEA Halls of Residence
The university is also home to the
Sainsbury Centre - a Norman Foster designed building
which houses the private art collection of the Sainsbury
family. There are three Henry Moore sculptures outside
this building.
Henry Moore Sculpture (Outside Sainsbury Centre)
In 1970, Malcolm Bradbury and Angus
Wilson founded the famous MA in Creative
Writing course at the university. It was the first course of its kind and
has spawned many imitators. Its emphasis has
traditionally been on fiction, but poets such as Andrew Motion
(the Poet
Laureate) and Michèle Roberts have
been involved as tutors. Ian McEwan was the first
ever graduate from the course but many other talented
students have followed including: Rose Tremain, Angela Carter, Clive Sinclair,
Adam Foulds, Simon Scarrow, Trezza Azzopardi, the poet
Owen Shears and Kazuo Ishiguro (An Artist
of the Floating World).
Malcolm Bradbury (1932-2000) was a critic, novelist
and TV script writer. He is probably best known for
The History Man (1975) - a campus novel set in the
fictional university of Watermouth - which later became
a TV play. Eating People is Wrong (1959) was an
earlier campus novel with a similar satirical tone.
Bradbury is buried in the churchyard of St. Mary the
Virgin at Tasburgh.
Angus Wilson (1913-1991) was also a novelist and is
particularly remembered for Anglo-Saxon Attitudes
(1956) and The Old Men at the Zoo (1961). Wilson
lived for many years in a cottage at Felsham Woodside in
Suffolk. He also edited East Anglia in Verse
and Prose (1982) - a collection which has proved
invaluable in constructing this website.
The Heart of Darkness
It has to be said that
many of the writers associated with the UEA Creative
Writing course have not been directly influenced by
Norfolk - but have brought with them inspirations from
other parts of the country.
W.G Sebald - although not linked to the writing
course - was a German lecturer at the UEA from 1970-2001. See
Poringland and
Framingham Earl.
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