C.S. Lewis used the name The Inklings for the informal Oxford writers’ group he attended.
The Inklings met mainly at Lewis’s rooms at Magdalen College and at the Eagle and Child pub in Oxford. The group was active from the 1930s into the early 1950s and included writers who read unfinished work aloud for criticism and encouragement.
J.R.R. Tolkien was one of its most famous members, and Charles Williams and Owen Barfield were also closely associated with the circle. The meetings were not a formal club with a fixed membership list or a published manifesto. The name itself had existed before the group took its best-known form, but Lewis helped establish its literary identity.
Members discussed drafts, myths, poetry, theology, and the craft of storytelling. Tolkien read parts of The Lord of the Rings to the group, while Lewis shared work connected with his Christian writing and fiction. The Inklings did not jointly write Narnia or Middle-earth; their importance came from conversation, feedback, and friendship.