Although both men served as English faculty, they occupied very different roles at the college, according to the Literary Traveler. C.S. Lewis remained firmly embedded in the literature faction while J.R.R. Tolkien stuck strictly to linguistics and the history of languages. Tolkien took his fascination with all things medieval to such an extreme that he refused to read any works written after the Middle Ages. In other words, no Charles Dickens, no Bronte sisters, and no Thomas Hardy.

Yet their friendship endured despite the radical schism in their academic preferences. Even more surprisingly, instead of causing a civil war within the English department, Lewis and Tolkien forged a pioneering bridge between both departmental factions. To these ends, they revised the English Department syllabus, making both study pathways richer for the effort. Despite synthesizing these disparate study paths through their friendship, Tolkien remained obsessed with constructed languages throughout his life, according to Babbel.

To further his Lord of the Rings trilogy, he invented expansive languages and histories to accompany them, including various dialects of Elvish and Dwarvish. Creating these languages represented a labor of love designed for a “linguistic aesthetic” in his works. A veritable language genius, Tolkien described his fascination as a “secret vice,” as reported by CNRS News. Yet, in an ironic twist, Tolkien ultimately satiated his linguistic obsession through the vehicle of literature.