What academic chair did C.S. Lewis hold at Cambridge University from 1954?

C.S. Lewis held the Chair of Medieval and Renaissance English at Cambridge University from 1954. He became the first holder of the Cambridge chair and retained the position until his death in 1963.

Before Cambridge, Lewis had spent most of his academic career at Oxford, especially as a fellow and tutor of Magdalen College. His appointment at Cambridge did not immediately end his Oxford connections; he continued to live near Oxford and remained associated with his earlier academic and literary circles.

The chair matched Lewis’s scholarly expertise. His work examined medieval and Renaissance literature, including allegory, literary history, and the development of English writing. His academic books include The Allegory of Love and English Literature in the Sixteenth Century, Excluding Drama.

The title is sometimes shortened in casual references, which can create confusion with chairs in modern literature or theology. Lewis was not appointed to a theology chair at Cambridge. His Cambridge professorship was specifically an English-literature position focused on earlier periods.