Jan 26 1954

From The Space Library

Christian scholar and fiction writer C.S. Lewis writes his last known letter to Arthur C. Clarke. The correspondence began between the two authors in December 1943 on the subject of whether mankind should venture into space. Five days earlier Clarke had written to Lewis saying that he wished to finally meet Lewis.

At a later date (probably also in 1954) the two met in the Eastgate pub in Oxford accompanied by Val Cleaver of the BIS and J.R.R. Tolkien. The discussion continued with neither side convincing the other of their position. Clarke later claimed that he didn't know who Tolkien was, perhaps indicating that the meeting took place before the publication of Tolkien's global best-seller The Lord of the Rings, which first appeared in July of 1954.