Tina specialises in working intensively and through dialogue with participants to bring a professional writer’s approach into the context of academic writing.
Courses offered by Tina Pepler
Tina’s courses will be tailored to suit clients’ specific requirements. They include:
- Immersive training (‘immersives’) and workshops for academic writing
- Writing retreats for PhD students, early career researchers and academics
- Finding your voice: developing as an academic writer
- Writing for different audiences
- Immersives for non-academic writing, including creative writing and writing for business
Tina’s work as a dramatist is often inspired by factual material that requires extensive research. She believes that techniques used in good story-telling can facilitate effective communication in any subject, and is particularly interested in transforming specialist knowledge into something others want to read.
Drawing on her experience as a writer, Tina designed the RLF’s original immersive training model, which is very flexible, but always combines group work with one-to-one sessions. She especially values immersives and writing retreats as an opportunity for this kind of sustained and often transformative engagement with the writing process.
Tina has a PhD in Drama from the University of Bristol. She understands how research takes on a life of its own: her original thesis subject – a history of radio drama – metamorphosed into a study of how far it’s possible to be creative in an institution like the BBC.
Having spent her childhood travelling, Tina is used to other cultures, and enjoys working with academics from other countries.
Tina was RLF Writing Fellow at Plymouth University and later at the University of Bristol, and is a core tutor on the MSt in Creative Writing at Oxford University.
I found a narrative voice I didn’t know I had, and changed my research question very radically as a result. The exercises reinforced the message, and it was very inspiring seeing other participants blossoming … into fiendishly writing all afternoon and evening, they were so energized. … The breadth of creativity was quite fantastic.
Of course it’s a given that you need the proper space and time to write – but without focus on content and narrative craft we’d be churning out the same turgid stuff, just more efficiently. … The week vastly exceeded my expectations and I think will have a profound effect on my writing.
It’s difficult to think of any lesson this week that hasn’t been profoundly transformative. … I know already that our discussions on the joy and possibilities of writing have made me see my thesis as a living, rather than a dead, thing.
The ‘taught’ content was carefully blended with the practical exercises, so that the practice led the theory, rather than the other way round. … Marina and Tina were helpful, insightful and concise, without being overly critical or judgmental … every moment has been suffused with creativity. Thank you for waking me up.
This retreat has been pretty life changing for me in terms of opening my eyes to my own potential as a writer both in academia and outside. I’ve been challenged by so much of what you’ve said to be a better writer. And you’ve been so affirming and encouraging as well. At this stage of my PhD where things have got so intense and crazy, this retreat has been an oasis and an antidote to the chaos.
