At which university did J.R.R. Tolkien study and later teach?

J.R.R. Tolkien studied and later taught at the University of Oxford. He entered Exeter College in 1911, initially studying Classics before focusing on English language and literature. Oxford became the main academic setting of his professional life.

After serving in the First World War, Tolkien returned to academic work. He held posts at the University of Leeds and then Oxford, where he became Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon and later Merton Professor of English Language and Literature. He retired from his Oxford professorship in 1959.

Tolkien’s Oxford career was central to his expertise in Old English, Middle English, Norse, and related languages. His famous 1936 lecture “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics” helped change scholarly approaches to the poem.

Oxford is sometimes mentioned only as the home of the Inklings, the informal literary discussion group that included Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. The university was both his workplace and the setting for those influential friendships.