English, Theatre and Performance

English, theatre, and performance is a combination that reflects a genuine intellectual kinship between the disciplines. Literature and theatre have been intertwined since the earliest dramatic texts, and studying them together allows you to move between reading critically and making practically, developing your analytical and creative capacities in parallel. Theatre and performance studies ask how meaning is made live, in bodies, in space, and in relation to an audience, while English literature develops your capacity to read, interpret, and argue about texts across their historical and cultural contexts.

Together, they form a programme that is both intellectually rigorous and practically engaged.

At the University of Leeds, this three-year, full-time programme combines literary study with workshop-based practical theatre work, allowing you to explore performance from both creative and critical perspectives. You will engage with English literature across a wide range of periods and forms, while also developing practical skills in performance, devising, direction, and the analysis of theatre as an art form. The programme is designed to be flexible, allowing you to pursue the areas that interest you most and to integrate your literary and theatrical interests across a wide range of options.

It includes a sandwich placement year for extended professional experience, a year abroad, and work placement as part of the course structure, giving you substantial practical and professional exposure alongside your academic study.

A typical entry tariff of 136 points reflects a strong but accessible admissions profile. Graduates go on to careers in theatre, education, arts management, drama facilitation, publishing, journalism, community arts, broadcasting, and cultural policy. The combination of critical thinking, creative practice, and communication skills the degree develops is valued across a wide range of employers.

Many graduates continue to postgraduate study in literature, theatre studies, creative writing, or arts administration, or pursue professional training in performance and direction.