British literature

Dame Agatha Christie

influence on C. S. Lewis's Space Trilogy.^[154]

J. R. R. Tolkien

From the early 1930s to late 1940s, an informal literary discussion group associated with the English faculty at the University of Oxford were The Inklings. Its lead­ing members were the major fantasy novelists; J. R. R. Tolkien and Irish writer C.S. Lewis. Lewis is known for The Screwtape Letters 1942, The Chronicles ofNarnia and The Space Trilogy, while Tolkien is best known as the au­thor of The Hobbit 1937, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.

2. 
   Later twentieth-century
   

Among important writers of genre fiction in the sec­ond half of the twentieth-century are thriller writer Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond 007. Fleming chroni­cled Bond’s adventures in twelve novels, including Casino Royale 1953.

In contrast to the larger-than-life spy capers of Bond, John le Carre was an author of spy novels who depicted a shadowy world of espionage and counter-espionage, and his best known novel The Spy Who Came in from the Cold 1963, is often regarded as one of the greatest in the genre. Frederick Forsyth writes thriller novels and Ken Follett writes spy thrillers, as well as historical novels, notably The Pillars of the Earth 1989.

War novels include Alistair MacLean thriller’s The Guns of Navarone 1957, Where Eagles Dare 1968, and Jack Higgins' The Eagle Has Landed 1975. Patrick O'Brian's nautical historical novels feature the Aubrey-Maturin se­ries set in the Royal Navy.

The “father of Wicca" Gerald Gardner began propagating his own version of witchcraft in the 1950s.

Ronald Welch's Carnegie Medal winning novel Knight Crusader is set in the 12th century and gives a depiction of the Third Crusade, featuring the Christian leader and King of England Richard the Lionheart. Nigel Tranter also wrote historical novels of celebrated Scottish war­riors; Robert the Bruce in The Bruce Trilogy.

In crime fiction, the murder mysteries of Ruth Rendell and P. D. James are popular.

Sir Arthur C. Clarke