The Inklings were a literary club

• 1930s–1940s for the Thursday readings.
• Lewis, Tolkien, Williams, Barfield, Warnie…
• The pub The Eagle and Child, nicknamed “The Bird and Baby.”

In brief

The Inklings were originally a student club founded around 1931 by Edward Tangye Lean. When the club disbanded, Lewis and Tolkien adopted the name for their circle of friends. The pun amused Tolkien: ink means “ink,” and an inkling is a vague idea or a hunch.

Did you know

The core members included C.S. Lewis, his brother Warren, J.R.R. Tolkien, the physician Robert “Humphrey” Havard, Hugo Dyson, Owen Barfield, when he was in Oxford, and Charles Williams, who moved from London in 1939 with his publishing house. Later additions were Nevill Coghill, Lord David Cecil, Adam Fox, followed by Christopher Tolkien and John Wain. No women, no rules, no minutes.

On screen

• The Thursday evenings, held in Lewis’s rooms at Magdalen College: a chapter or poem was read aloud, then harshly criticized.
• The Tuesday lunchtimes at the pub The Eagle and Child, nicknamed “The Bird and Baby,” in a small room at the back.

Chapters from The Lord of the Rings, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, and novels by Williams and memoirs by Warnie were heard there. The Chronicles of Narnia, however, were not read at the Inklings, or only very rarely.

Going further

The Thursday readings ended around 1949. The pub meetings continued into the 1960s, then moved to the Lamb and Flag across the street. The death of Charles Williams in 1945 left a great void.

See also

• J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis
• Biography of C.S. Lewis (2): From the Inklings to Narnia, 1932–1963
• Timeline of C.S. Lewis’s life
• A Lion in the English Countryside: Charles Williams and the Invisible at the Inklings’ Table
• The Alter Ego and the Anti-Self: Arthur Greeves and Owen Barfield, the Two Friendships That Shaped Lewis