CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien, Susan Cooper, Alan Garner and Philip Pullman have more than their standings as celebrated authors in common.

In a writing group informally known as the Oxford School, all five were Oxford-educated. The Bodleian is the home of the books which fuelled their myths and dreams. So the witches of the first folio of Macbeth and the alchemists of the philosophers’ stone-pursuing Ripley Rolls, for example, begin paths which can be traced all the way to the words of these towering writers.

An alethiometer, conjured by Pullman as a truth-telling sphere, accompanies one of Garner’s “owl service” plates in a line-up of magical materials within a space with a decidedly enchanted atmosphere of its own.

And the Duke Humfrey’s Library was the place where Garner consulted demonic spellbooks, Harry Potter films were shot (as well as in the Bodleian’s Divinity School) and Lewis and Tolkien pored over dusty manuscripts and rare books.

Co-curators Sarah Wheale and Dr Judith Priestman say their task, which has seen them work with Pullman, Garner and Cooper, has been a “real privilege” and represents a “fabulous opportunity” for guests to eye up 900 years of literary heritage.

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