What was the title of C.S. Lewis’s first scholarly book on English literature?

The Allegory of Love was C.S. Lewis’s first scholarly book on English literature.

Published in 1936, The Allegory of Love examines allegorical and courtly love traditions in medieval and Renaissance literature. Lewis discusses writers and works including Ovid, the Roman de la Rose, Dante, Edmund Spenser, and John Milton, tracing how ideas about love changed across literary periods.

The book established Lewis as a major literary scholar before he became widely known for Christian apologetics and children’s fiction. Its argument connects literary forms with intellectual and cultural history, rather than treating poems and stories as isolated works.

Lewis later wrote other influential studies, including A Preface to Paradise Lost and The Discarded Image. The Allegory of Love is not a novel and should not be confused with his later popular books about faith. Its academic success helped secure his reputation in English studies at Oxford.