I swear literally every other humanities uni student fantasises about one day writing some ground-breaking literary masterpiece (and proving to their lecturers that they can, in fact, spell). Some UK unis are apparently much better at producing award-winning authors than others.
Aura Print researched where all the prize winning and shortlisted authors on the Selected British Literary Prizes (1990-2022) database went to uni. They then made a list of which unis produced the most literary icons. I guess these are the unis to aim for if you dream of having your own shelf in Waterstones.
The UK uni that’s most likely to turn you into a prize-winning author is the University of Oxford. Unsurprisingly, the University of Cambridge isn’t too far behind it. What is interesting is that two UK unis that aren’t even in the Russell Group – the University of East Anglia (UEA) and Bath Spa University. UEA is known for having really good creative writing courses.
If you can’t face studying in the UK, quite a few unis in other places produced lots of authors on the Selected British Literary Prizes (1990-2022) database. Lots of award-winning authors went to Harvard University, Trinity College Dublin, Columbia University, the University of Iowa, Queen’s University in Canada, Yale University, University College Dublin, Radcliffe College and Brown University.
So, here are the UK unis that have produced the most award-winning (or shortlisted) authors:
=8. Bath Spa University – seven authors
=8. University of York – seven authors
I reckon that if you spent enough time in King’s Manor at York, you’d become some literary genius
7. University of Glasgow – eight authors
6. University of Edinburgh – nine authors
5. University of Sheffield – 10 authors
=3. University of East Anglia (UEA) – 29 authors
=3. University of London – 29 authors
2. University of Cambridge – 73 authors
1. University of Oxford – 116 authors
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