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The Social History of the Inklings, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, 1939–1945

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The Social History of the Inklings, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, 1939–1945 Volume 2 Number 1 Article 4 12-15-1970 The Social History of the Inklings, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, 1939–1945 Glen GoodKnight Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore Part of the Children's and Young Adult Literature Commons Recommended Citation GoodKnight, Glen (1970) "The Social History of the Inklings, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, 1939–1945," Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 2 : No. 1 , Article 4. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol2/iss1/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Mythopoeic Society at SWOSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature by an authorized editor of SWOSU Digital Commons. An ADA compliant document is available upon request. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To join the Mythopoeic Society go to: http://www.mythsoc.org/join.htm Mythcon 51: A VIRTUAL “HALFLING” MYTHCON July 31 - August 1, 2021 (Saturday and Sunday) http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-51.htm Mythcon 52: The Mythic, the Fantastic, and the Alien Albuquerque, New Mexico; July 29 - August 1, 2022 http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-52.htm Abstract Overview of the formation and meetings of the Inklings; primarily discusses the WWII era. Discusses Williams as “catalyst” and focuses mainly on the effects of his membership and unexpected death on the group. Additional Keywords Inklings—History—1939–1945; Lewis, C.S.—Friends and associates; Tolkien, J.R.R.—Friends and associates; Williams, Charles—Friends and associates This article is available in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol2/iss1/4 The Social History of the Inklings, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, 1939-1945 by Glen GoodKnight accepted him, inviting him to speak to all kinds of groups, both In 1939 Europe again was to plunge the world into war. religious and secular. As Lewis and Tolkien found this period The period of the war, 1939-1945, provides that time span and backdrop for this article. Oxford, that ancient town and uni­ most stimulating, to affect their later lives, Williams found his abilities and recognition had finally arrived. This was to versity, porvides both the scenery and furniture for the move­ ments of the three men that the Mythopoeic Society was founded be the last and greatest chapter of his life. to study and discuss. In 1939 C.S. Lewis was 41 years old, a Fellow of Magdalen The Inklings College for 14 years, and had established a modest but admirable The majority of the contacts these three men had with one reputation with the publication of Pilgrim 's Regress in 1933 and another were in and through the Inklings. Lewis' brother, Warren the prize-winning The Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tra­ H. Lewis, described the Inklings as "neither a club nor a liter­ dition, a book of literary criticism in 1936. ary society, though it partook of the nature of both." 5 The J.R.R. Tolkien, then 47, was Lewis' best friend. He was group met every Thursday evening after dinner in C.S. Lewis' mag­ Professor of Anglo-Szxon at Oxford University and a Fellow of nificent private rooms at Magdalen College, which included a big Pembroke College, and had established a respectable and moderate sitting room on the first floor of the New buildings, looking out reputation in literary criticism with Sir Gawain and the Green on the Grove, and another smaller sitting room and a bedroom, Knight (edited with E.Vv Gordon) in 1925, Beowulf : The Monsters looking across to the Cloisters and the Tower. Lewis had to fur­ and the Critics in 1936, and his classic fantasy The Hobbit in nish these rooms at his own expense, and as a bachelor he did 1937. Tolkien had been a friend before Lewis' conversion from so in "perfunctory and notably economical style." 6 Atheism to Christianity in 1929 and had been a factor in its The meetings did not begin or end at any set hour, though fruition. In Lewis’ autobiography he described that the initial there was an understanding that no one would consider arriving friendship in 1925: after ten-thirty. Even though there was no formal structure, ...marked the breakdown of two old prejudices. At my there seemed to have been an unvarying ritual. W.H. Lewis describ­ first coming into the world I had been (im plicitly) ed it: When half a dozen or so had arrived, tea would be pro­ warned never to trust a Papist, and at my first coming duced, and when pipes were well alight, Jack /_as C.S. into the English Faculty (explicitly) never to trust Lewis preferred informally to be called_/ would say, a philologist. Tolkien was both." 1 'Well, has nobody got anything to read us?' Out would At the beginning of the war these men were fairly well come a manuscript, and we would settle down to sit in known within academic circles; the most productive and stim­ judgement upon it - real unbiased judgement, too, since ulating period of their lives was about to begin. we were no mutual admiration society: praise for good Alice Hadfield, a close friend and biographer of Charles work was unstinted, but censure for bad work - or even W illiams, wrote "darkness was creeping over Europe and England, not-so-good work was often brutally frank. To read to the old darkness of chaos and separation, the rejection of love, the Inklings was a formidable ordeal,... 7 exchange and coinherence. Life withdrew to its bases." 2 As In a letter dated 11 November 1939, Lewis described to his insanity and death took the world, Oxford continued to be one of brother one of the meetings: the bases where rational and creative life continued. On Thursday we had a meeting of the Inklings - You and Lewis and Tolkien belonged to a circle of friends which Coghill absent unfortunately. We dined at the East- met frequently, known as the Inklings. Each of the members were gate. I have never in my life seen Dyson so exuberant in some way connected with the academic community. But the most - 'A roaring cataract of nonsense.' The bill of fare interesting phase of their history was just starting. Unknow­ afterwards, consisted of a section of the new Hobbit ingly the group was to meet a man who was to be a kind of cre­ book from Tolkien, a nativity play from Ch. Williams ative catalyst. In a letter to his brother, dated 10 September (unusually intelligible for him, and approved by all), 1939, Lewis wrote: and a chapter of the book on the Problem of Pain from Along with these not very pleasant indirect results me. 8 of the University Press has moved to Oxford, so that The Inklings during the war years were: C.S. Lewis, Warren Charles Williams is living here." 3 H. Lewis, Fr. Gervase /lathew, J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, The catalyst had arrived. Colin Hardy, Adam Fox, and Lewis' physician - Robert Havard. Charles Williams was then 53, and employed at the Oxford Others, who attended less frequently, and for one reason or an­ University Press in an editorial capacity. Because of his other were not fully entered into to group were: Nevil Coghill, fam ily's financial inability when he was young, he had found it David Cecil, H.V.D. Dyson, Owen Barfield, C.L. Wrenn, John Wain, unable to finish college, yet his natural genius and his wide and rarely, Dorothy Sayers. independent reading were more than sufficient to overcome this As a group, the Inklings is difficult to describe in any difficulty. Very few of his new companions thought himself precise way because of the differences of the member's intellec­ superior, except perhaps in the accumulation of sheer fact. tual interests and occupations. Lewis described the diversity of Lewis commented here: the group in passing in a letter to his brother dated 3 Feb. 1940: On the ancients and on the early Middle Ages there We had an evening almost equally compounded of m erri­ were one or two present with whom he could not com­ ment, piety, and literature. Rum this time again. The pete, nor had he an exact knowledge of any of the Inklings is now really very well provided, with Adam great philosophers; but in history, theology, legend, comparative religion, and (above all) English lit­ erature from Shakespeare down, his knowledge was surprising. 4 None of the three men were natives of Oxford. Lewis was born in Belfast, North Ireland; Tolkien in Bloemfontein, South Africa. Williams was a native of London. He never seemed to be entirely at home in the more rustic and provincial Oxford. His wife and son also tried to settle in the city, but like many preferred London to exile and soon returned. Because of his position, there was no choosing. Except for weekends with his wife, or to lecture, he never left Oxford again. His qualifications as a scholar and poet were quickly recog­ nized by the University. Within three years of arriving, he was lecturing in the University, acting as tutor in St. Hilda's College, and was given an honorary M.A. degree. The city also 7 Fox as chaplain, you as army, Barfield as lawyer, Havard of his presence was, indeed, chiefly made clear by as doctor - almost all the estates - except of course the gap which was left on the rare occasions when he any who could actually produce a single necessity of did not turn up.
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