Director of Studies
Sub-Director of Studies
A-level or IB Higher Level English Literature or English Language and Literature. Applicants taking the IB Diploma are expected to have a 7 in their Higher Level English course.
Common subjects taken by successful English applicants – in addition to English Literature – include: History, Languages, Mathematics, Religious Studies, Government and Politics, Drama and Theatre Studies, and Psychology. We welcome applications from candidates who are taking a joint A-level in English Literature/English Language and we do not rule any applicant out on the basis of their A-level choices.
All applicants invited for interview are required to take a 90-minute pre-interview essay/text response assessment. Further information on College Admissions Assessments.
Applicants are required to submit two pieces of written work. This should be in essay format with a word limit of up to 1500 words. The work can be extracted from an EPQ.
Having several teaching Fellows in English, most of whom hold permanent Faculty positions, enables our students to engage with a wide range of historical periods and areas of specialisation within the College. In addition, our early career Research Fellows and those now retired from teaching are all fully engaged in the subject community and supporting undergraduates.
With our typical annual intake of seven undergraduates, this makes for a large, talented, friendly and vibrant community of people studying and teaching English at St John’s, supported by a lively English Society organising socials, events and dinners.
The College Library’s Special Collections are particularly rich for English. Our Fellows call on our literary manuscripts and rare first editions to support their undergraduate teaching.
Arguably St John’s most famous alumnus, William Wordsworth (pictured right) is celebrated the world over as the definitive poet of nature and the chief instigator of the literary movement known as British Romanticism. He composed some of the most memorable poetry in the English language.
English students remain keen competitors for our wide range of annual prize awards for writing, such as the Douglas Adams Prize for humorous writing.
Watch this video to find out more about the English course at Cambridge.
We select the brightest and most committed students, so work hard to secure excellent examination results, and continue to perform very well in school/college in your penultimate and final years to enable your teachers to confirm that you are one of their very best students when writing your UCAS reference.
We are looking for independent thinkers and enthusiastic researchers, who love reading and writing and are eager to discover new texts and new ideas.
Successful applicants will display intellectual curiosity and a capacity to comprehend and engage with counter-arguments. We want to see your genuine interest in literature evidenced by wide, self-motivated reading across genres and periods, outside the school / college curriculum.
Such 'super-curricular' reading will also make a big difference to your knowledge and understanding. It will give you practice in independent critical analysis of unfamiliar literary texts, which forms part of the pre-interview assessment and interview.
In addition to wide reading, activities such as museum/gallery visits and completing MOOCs can help to distinguish you from applicants who are doing well in school or college but who are not pursuing their academic interests to the next level.
When asked to complete the pre-interview assessment (ELAT), practice against the clock using available past papers, and if you are called for interview, refresh your memory about anything you said on your ELAT script and in your UCAS personal statement, as well as practicing comprehension and analysis of short unseen passages.
