![](https://images.suitcasemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/10141222/12-of-the-uks-most-inspiring-literary-destinations_653cb684e7944.jpeg)
Oxford
United Kingdom
J. R. R. Tolkien, Lewis Carroll, C. S. Lewis, Phillip Pullman
High-flyers are ten a penny in Oxford, and sure enough, the city has inspired a host of literary household names. Many of them were academics at the University of Oxford, including J. R. R. Tolkien (who dreamed up Middle Earth while teaching Anglo-Saxon history at Pembroke College), C. S. Lewis, Oscar Wilde, William Golding and later Helen Fielding and Philip Pullman.
Visit Oxford Botanic Gardens to sit on Will and Lyra's bench from the His Dark Materials trilogy, find the doorway to Narnia along St Mary's Passage or pay your respects to The Oxford Dodo (which made its way into Carroll's Alice in Wonderland) at the Oxford Museum of Natural History. Worked up an appetite exploring? Stop by The Eagle and Child pub on St Giles' where The Inklings literary discussion group once gathered in the Rabbit Room.