Magdalen College employed C.S. Lewis as a tutor in English literature for most of his Oxford career.
Lewis became a Fellow and tutor in English at Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1925. He remained there until 1954, teaching students, examining work, and developing the scholarly reputation that accompanied his fiction and apologetics. The college’s medieval buildings and grounds also became closely associated with his Oxford years.
Lewis’s position at Magdalen was a tutorial fellowship rather than a modern university department post. In 1954 he left Oxford for Cambridge, where he became the first holder of the Chair of Medieval and Renaissance English at Magdalene College. The similar names of Magdalen College in Oxford and Magdalene College in Cambridge often cause confusion: the Oxford college has no final “e,” while the Cambridge college does.