Melanie Taylor
English literature A level, BA and MA graduate and PhD candidate with Open University.
“Throughout my career I found that my skills in English were invaluable in enabling me to communicate clearly, both in writing and orally, and so helped me engage effectively and persuasively with employers, clients and colleagues. I had learnt, and am still learning, crucial skills in comprehending, analysing and evaluating text of all kinds. At a very basic level, the ability to produce an eye-catching c.v., compose a pithy and persuasive email or pick apart the strengths and weaknesses in another’s argument are invaluable.
The opportunity to explore the world and the whole of human history via the written word is a massive privilege and has yielded riches which I couldn’t even begin to measure. I’ve read and studied material as diverse as Victorian novels, Bushmen folklore, biblical apocrypha, Mills and Boon romances, French philosophy, modernist poetry and American thrillers. Echoes and resonances of these crop up time and again, and they all, in their own way, enrich my understanding of the world. And I don’t do badly at University Challenge either!”