Jack Arthur Walter Bennett (1911 – 1981) was born in New Zealand. He studied at Auckland University before getting a scholarship to Oxford University. Apparently he was often forgetful and considered himself lucky to have gotten the scholarship at all, as he completely forgot to include any testimonials in his application. There was an Oxford Group called the “New Zealand Mafia,” made up of young students from New Zealand, which Bennett was a member of. He formed many long-lasting relationships among the members of this group.
Bennett worked with the British Information Service in America during the Second World War. He returned to Oxford at the end of the war, in 1943. From 1956 to 1980 he was the editor of the journal Medium Aevam as a scholar of Middle English Literature. In 1964, he took over C.S. Lewis’ old position as a Professor of Medieval and Renaissance English at Cambridge University. Bennett was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1976. He worked on the volume “Middle English Literature” for the Oxford History of English Literature. It was completed after Bennett’s death by Douglas Gray and was published in 1986.
He died at the age of 70 and was buried at the Parish of the Ascension Burial Ground in Cambridge with his wife, Gwyneth.
~~~
A committed Christian, English academic, and member of the Inklings literary group, Henry Victor (Hugo) Dyson was born in 1896. He taught English at the University of Reading between the years of 1924 to 1945, when he obtained a fellowship with Merton College Oxford. He continued working as an emeritus fellow even after his retirement in 1963, giving many memorable lectures to his students about the “modern” literature paper and discussing other writers with the insight of one who was a personal friend with many of the authors.
Comparatively, Dyson wasn’t particularly prolific in his own writing, but his lectures and conversation had a dramatic effect on his students and others around him. He was an expert on Shakespeare. In the early 1960s he was asked to host some televised lectures and plays about the great playwright, and because of this Dyson made a few good friends in the filmmaking business, earning him a small part in the 1965 film, Darling.
Dyson was known as the fun-loving member of the Inklings literary group, and attended meetings regularly. He lived in the east Oxford suburb of Headington on Sandfield Road (the same road J.R.R. Tolkien lived on for some time) until his death in 1975. Dyson was buried in Holywell Cemetery Oxford.
~~~
Born in 1883, Adam Fox was an academic, lecturer, and poet. During his life he served as the Dean of Divinity at Magdalen College Oxford, a Professor of Poetry (1938-1942), Canon of Westminster Abbey, and Warden of Radley College.
His lengthy poem, titled Old King Coel, was published in a four-book set, and he also wrote Plato for Pleasure. Fox believed strongly in making literature and poetry accessible and intelligible, so that it could be properly appreciated. He wanted to rekindle an interest in great thinkers like Plato, and the study of platonic dialogues. He was also a strong advocate of intensive study of the works of Shakespeare.
In 1960 Fox won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his biography of William Ralph Inge, a famous theologian. He died in 1977 and is buried in Poet’s Corner.
~~~
Clive Staples Lewis, more commonly known as C.S. Lewis, was born November 29th, 1898. He was a novelist, poet, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian, and Christian apologist. He held an academic position at Oxford University (Magdalen College) from 1925 to 1954, and also held an academic position at Cambridge University from 1954 to 1963. His best known works of fiction are The Screwtape Letters, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Space Trilogy, and his Christian apologetics non-fiction works Mere Christianity, Miracles, and The Problem of Pain.
He was close friends with his fellow novelist and fellow English faculty member at Oxford University, J.R.R. Tolkien. Both were active members in the informal Oxford literary group known as the Inklings.
Lewis was initially baptized into the Church of Ireland but fell away from his faith during his adolescence. Owing to the influence of many of his friends, including Tolkien, he returned to the Anglican Communion at the age of 32, which had a profound effect on his work. His wartime radio broadcasts on the subject of Christianity brought him worldwide acclaim.
In 1956, he married the American writer Joy Davidman. She was 17 years younger than him and died 4 years after they were married. Lewis died from renal failure 1 week before his 65th birthday 3 years later, on November 22nd, 1963.
~~~
On the 21st of November, 1924, Christopher Reuel Tolkien, editor, novelist, academic, and third son of JR.R. Tolkien, was born in Leeds, England. He was educated at the Dragon School in Oxford and the Oratory School. As a child he listened to his father’s tales of Middle Earth, and as a teenager, he gave feedback on The Lord of the Rings.
In 1943, Tolkien entered the Royal Air Force and served as a pilot and flying officer. After the war ended, he studied English at Oxford University. He followed in his father’s footsteps, becoming a lecturer and tutor in English Language at New College, Oxford. He held this position from 1964 to 1975. Tolkien is best known, however, as the editor of much of his father’s posthumously published work. He produced and redrew the original maps of Middle Earth that appeared in the books, as his father’s maps were sometimes contradictory.
In 2001, The Lord of the Rings was set to become a film directed by Peter Jackson. Tolkien was skeptical about the films being able to retain the essence of his father’s work, but didn’t officially discourage the effort.
Tolkien currently lives in France with his second wife, Baille Tolkien (nee Klass), and their two children.
~~~
On January 3rd, 1892, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born. An English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, Tolkien is best known for his classic high fantasy works: The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.
Tolkien’s studies were always very important to him. When the First World War began, he delayed enlisting until after he’d gotten his degree, and then joined the army in 1915. Tolkien married Edith Mary Bratt on March 22nd, 1916.
He served as the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College Oxford from 1925 to 1945, and the Merton Professor of English Language and Literature at Merton College Oxford from 1945 to 1959. He was close to C.S. Lewis for a long while, both of them being members of an Oxford literary group called the Inklings.
Tolkien completed The Lord of the Rings in 1948. From the time it was published (1954-1955) until his death (1973), Tolkien was to gain more and more popularity from this three-book work and its prequel, The Hobbit.
Edith Tolkien died in 1971. A year after, Tolkien was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II. He died September 2nd, 1973 and was buried beside his wife under a tombstone engraved with the names Beren and Luthien along with their given names.
~~~
Born the 20th of September 1886 in London, Charles Williams was educated at St. Albans School Hertfordshire as a boy and was awarded a scholarship to University College London. He wasn’t able to get a degree there because of financial circumstances however, and he obtained a job at the Methodist bookroom. He was hired by the Oxford University Press as a proofreading assistant in 1908, and worked up to the position of editor.
Williams edited many notable works. He also wrote a few himself, including poetry, works of literary criticism, theology, history, biography, and tons of book reviews. His best known novels are War in Heaven (1930), Descent into Hell (1937), and All Hallows’ Eve (1945). They were described as supernatural thrillers by Williams’ fan, T.S. Eliot.
Other admirers of Williams were W.H. Auden and C.S. Lewis. Williams read Lewis’ Allegory of Love around the same time that Lewis read Williams’ The Place of the Lion, and the two of them both wrote a letter to the other, congratulating them and saying how much they’d enjoyed the book. The letters crossed in the mail and kindled an enduring friendship between the two men.
Oxford University Press moved its offices from London to Oxford when World War II broke out. Williams moved to Oxford as well. This enabled him to attend Inklings meetings regularly. He also began to give lectures at Oxford, and received an honorary M.A. degree. He died May 15 1945 and was buried in St. Cross Churchyard in Oxford.