The RSL Brookleaze Grants

The purpose of these grants is to buy time for novelists, short-story writers, poets or playwrights with pieces of work in hand. The Council of the RSL, who will be responsible for awarding the grants, will be particularly interested in applications from writers who wish to buy time away from their normal lives – who need to take sabbaticals from their jobs, for example, or who need to travel abroad for the purpose of research.

A total of £5,000 will be available annually, and this may be awarded either as one grant of £5,000 or two of £2,500. Council reserves the right to withhold grants if applications are not thought to be sufficiently compelling.

To be eligible to apply, a writer must have had work previously published, or have been newly commissioned, by a trade publisher in the UK.

If you wish to make an application, please write a short (one side of A4) letter, describing the project on which you are engaged, detailing your previous work, explaining how you would plan to use a grant, and giving a brief outline of your financial circumstances.

Applications should be sent to Maggie Fergusson, The Royal Society of Literature, Somerset House, London WC2R 1LA ([email protected]; 020 7845 4676).