The Inklings cover art

The Inklings

C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and Their Friends

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The Inklings

By: Humphrey Carpenter
Narrated by: Bernard Mayes
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About this listen

During the 1930s at Oxford, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Charles Williams - remarkable friends, writers, and scholars - met regularly to discuss philosophy and literature and to read aloud from their own works in progress. Calling themselves the Inklings, their circle grew. It was in this company that such classics as The Lord of the Rings, The Screwtape Letters, and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe first found an audience.

Author Humphrey Carpenter was born in Oxford and was acquainted with Tolkien, Hugo Dyson, and several other Inklings. In this remarkable reconstruction of their meetings and momentous friendships, Carpenter brings to life those warm and enchanting evenings in Lewis' rooms at Magdalen College, when their imaginations ran wild. His account offers exciting insights into the influence these brilliant individuals had on each other's developing ideas and writing.

©1990 Humphrey Carpenter (P)1990 Blackstone Audio, Inc. Art & Literature Authors European Literary History & Criticism World Literature Celebrity Feel-Good

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All stars
Most relevant  
Carpenter gives a number of key insights that gave me a good understanding of the flow if thinking that threw up such a lively spirituality.

Insightful account of the Inklings

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I would fecommend it for the English, but also the story. I learned a lot and enjoyed the glinpse into academia in old England.

a pleasant historic story well told,

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A really fascinating and informative biography and analysis of some great 20th century writers. We listened in rapt attention right to the end.

fascinating

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I was very interested in this book, which was well read and pleasant to listen to. The facts of these men’s lives and their stories are fascinating. However, Humphrey Carpenter appears sympathetic with all of his characters except Lewis, whom he seems to feel himself on a mission to ‘reveal’ as less worthy than other biographies have painted him. His supposed revelations are unsympathetic, unperceptive and occasionally ridiculous- as for example his wholly unnecessary and clearly untrue suggestion that Lewis’s marriage might not have been consummated. Worse, he is blind to God and things of the spirit, and almost all of his assumptions about Christianity - and therefore Lewis’s beliefs - are wrong-headed.
I still value this book for its biographical evocation of an era and an elite society within that era, but I gradually had to learn to disregard many of its supposed insights.

Unsympathetic to Christianity

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A well written study of the Inkings where the argument is made and justified that C.S. Lewis was the reason for their formation and essentially the glue that held them together. With making this argument, the book at times turns more into a biography of Lewis, touching moderately on Charles Williams and sparingly on Tolkien. Overall, a comprehensive study essential to anyone interested in Lewis, Tolkien, Williams or the Inklings as a group.

Comprehensive with a strong argument

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This book shines an interesting (if at times a bit of a scholarly or literary) light on several interlinked personalities involved in what can only be considered one of the most impactful literary milieux of the 20th century, the effects of their individual efforts in varying degrees still reaching us today.
The book has a heavy focus on CS Lewis and in lesser degree on Charles Williams, even less so on Tolkien, but the overall effect is a thoroughly insightful look into how these men did (and didn't) impact eachothers creative processes and personal philosophies, the take away one has is that we should feel a great deal of gratitude for their continued friendships and encouragement of one anothers genius, without this at times chaotic intermarriage of minds so many of the works we love or may still come to discover may never have seen print.

Interesting insights

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It has been wonderful to get a glimpse of the world of C S Lewis & J R R Tolkein. Excellent all round.

I Was Sorry To Come To The End

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A few things about this, my own humble opinion:

1: The narrator doesn’t hold your attention. He speaks so slowly and is quite monotone that there were many times I drifted off thinking about something else. Found listening to speed 1.7 helped. Also, it doesn’t help that this is not a new recording. This is from a taped recording from 1990 and it sounds like it.
2: I had been looking forward to a book about the Inklings for a few years. Unfortunately, this isn’t about the Inklings really, but mainly about Lewis.
3: Around halfway through the book it dips into pure fiction in a chapter that’s well over an hour listen, and that, for me, was the point where I almost decided to ditch this thing.

A chore

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