Acclaimed author Margaret Atwood will be visiting the University of Glasgow today (Tuesday 26 September) to present a masterclass in creative writing.

Following her appointment as the inaugural Muriel Spark Fellow by the Scottish Arts Council, Margaret Atwood will answer questions presented by Glasgow's Poet Laureate and Glasgow University Writer-in-Residence, Liz Lochhead, on her life and work.

A lively and often provocative speaker, Canada's most eminent author and poet will offer advice on creative writing to staff and students of the University's Creative Writing course, local school pupils and members of the public.

Event host and convener of the University's Creative Writing Masters course, Professor Michael Schmidt, said: "It's a wonderful opportunity for our students and all our colleagues to have such a well-loved novelist and poet at the University. She has written more than 30 works of fiction, poetry and critical essays, and she received the Booker Prize for Fiction in 2000. Margaret Atwood is an inspiration to us and to our students. We're looking forward to meeting her in person, learning more about her motives and methods, and hoping for some advice and guidance in the area of imaginative writing. I'm especially glad that we are able to open the event to the wider public."

Gavin Wallace, Head of Literature, Scottish Arts Council, said: 'We're especially pleased that the academic community of Glasgow University, and the wider public, will have this unique opportunity to be inspired and enlightened by a writer as gifted and acclaimed as Margaret Atwood. It's very fitting that an institution in Scotland which has pioneered the teaching of creative writing in Scotland, and our first Muriel Spark International Fellow, are able to have this dialogue'.

After the masterclass Margaret Atwood will be signing copies of her latest work Moral Disorder.

Other works by Canadian-born Margaret Atwood include Booker Prize winner The Blind Assassin and Booker Prize shortlisted novels The Handsmaid's Tale, Cat's Eyes, Alias Grace, and Oryx and Crake, which was also shortlisted for the 2004 Orange Prize for fiction. In 2005 Margaret Atwood also received the Edinburgh International Book Festival Enlightenment Award.

The masterclass is free and open to the public. The class will be held in Wellington Church, University Avenue at 2pm. For more information please contact Wendy Burt on 0141 330 8538

Kate Richardson (K.Richardson@admin.gla.ac.uk)

1. For further information or to attend the event please contact the University of Glasgow Media Relations Office on 0141 330 3683 or email K.richardson@admin.gla.ac.uk

2. Press and photographers are invited to attend the event. There will be a photocall after the masterclass at 3.30pm at the Wellington Church, University Avenue where Margaret Atwood and Liz Lochhead will be available for photo opportunity. Please let the Media Relations Office know if you plan to attend.

3. The Margaret Atwood masterclass has been organised by the University of Glasgow? Creative Writing Masters Course

First published: 26 September 2006