A couple of months ago, I wrote about “‘The Country Around Edgestow’: A Map from C.S. Lewis’ That Hideous Strength by Tim Kirk.” Tim Kirk’s fantasy map was part of an early Mythlore article, “Arthurian & Cosmic Myth in That Hideous Strength” by Margaret Hannay (1970). I have confessed before that I have tried to work out some of the local (i.e., the ones on Earth) places in C.S. Lewis’ Ransom Cycle. Though I spent a day hiking with Rev. Stephen Winter–the “Wisdom from the Lord of the Rings” blogger–hoping to feel Lewis’ real schoolboy environment of Malvern and environs behind Dr. Ransom’s earthly home base, I am ill equipped to succeed in this quest. But in writing my article, “What is the Significance of Worc(h)ester in C.S. Lewis’ Ransom Cycle?,” I became intrigued by the possibilities of real places in C.S. Lewis’ mind that sit behind his fictional English towns and countrysides.

One of Lewis’ key terran fictional places is “Edgestow,” the home of Bragdon Wood, Bracton College, and the literary centre of the events in That Hideous Strength. In my reading about Lewis and Arthurian literature, I happened upon Margaret Hannay’s piece, which included Tim Kirk’s map of “The Country Around Edgestow.” As a reading tool, I have come to like this fairly detailed Edgestow pictorial map. With the help of Mythlore editor Janet Brennan Croft, Tim Kirk kindly gave me permission to share the map on A Pilgrim in Narnia. You can download a PDF of Hannay’s article with Kirk’s map in context here. And there is a clearer, zoom-able version of the map here. 

Continuing on my irresponsible musings like “What is the Significance of Worc(h)ester in C.S. Lewis’ Ransom Cycle?” and connections between Lewis’ real life hills and towns in his fiction, I found Tim Kirk’s map opened up some imaginative possibilities for me–even if they did not answer all the questions I would like to ask. During the pretty great discussion that followed that post, Tolkien historian John Garth–having recently written a visual and literary history, The Worlds of J.R.R. Tolkien–asked this perceptive question: “There’s quite a bit of Oxford in that map, isn’t there?”

Since I lack the artistic and geographic skills to really capture that comparison or assess it if I saw it, I left the question behind. And then, in a box of materials from one of C.S. Lewis’ past students, Dr. E.L. Edmonds, I found this map tucked into an old guidebook. There is a bit of damage and my photography skills are limited, but it certainly does give some scope for imaginative comparison with Tim Kirk’s Edgestow map. I will allow you good folk to have fun making links and noting differences.

If you drag and drop the map into most browsers, you should be able to make it bigger to look for details.

And because it can be fun to note a change in perspective, time, and technology, you may enjoy this interactive aerial photograph that gives a 360° view of Oxford. Scrolling over with your mouse will let you explore various sites of Oxford, but it is even cooler with your phone or tablet, as the camera rolls as you do (If your experience of WordPress does not load the interactive photo, click through to Facebook you can see the picture).