Tolkien in Oxford

At King Edward’s School Tolkien gained a scholarship to attend Exeter College, at Oxford University, to study classics. Tolkien left Birmingham for Oxford in October 1911; he returned often to visit family and friends.

In 1916 Ronald married Edith, shortly before leaving to fight in France. After the war he worked in Oxford and then Leeds. In 1925 he returned to Oxford with his young family to become the Professor of Anglo-Saxon. He transformed the view of Middle English and Anglo-Saxon epic poems such as Beowulf. He lived in Oxford for most of the rest of his life and died in 1973.