The Inklings was an informal literary discussion group associated with the University of Oxford, England, for nearly two decades between the early 1930s and late 1949. The Inklings were literary enthusiasts who praised the value of narrative in fiction, and encouraged the writing of fantasy. Although Christian values were notably present in several members' work, there were also irreligious members of the discussion group.

The more regular members of the Inklings, many of them academics at the University, included J. R. R. "Tollers" Tolkien, C. S. "Jack" Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams, Tolkien's son Christopher, Lewis' elder brother Warren or "Warnie", Roger Lancelyn Green, Adam Fox, Hugo Dyson, R. A. "Humphrey" Havard, J. A. W. Bennett, Lord David Cecil, and Nevill Coghill. More infrequent visitors included Percy Bates, Enid Blyton, Charles Leslie Wrenn, Colin Hardie, James Dundas-Grant, John David Arnett, Jon Fromke, John Wain, R. B. McCallum, Gervase Mathew, and C. E. Stevens. Guests included author E. R. Eddison and South African poet Roy Campbell.

Henry Victor Dyson Dyson (1896–1975), generally known as Hugo Dyson and who signed his writings H. V. D. Dyson, was an English academic and a member of the Inklings literary group. He was a committed Christian, and together with J.R.R. Tolkien, he helped persuade C.S. Lewis to convert to Christianity.

Dyson taught English at the University of Reading from 1924 until obtaining a fellowship with Merton College, Oxford in 1945. He retired in 1963 but returned as emeritus fellow in 1969, teaching the newly-introduced "modern" literature paper. His tutorials were memorable because many of the writers discussed had been personal friends of his.

Dyson was not a prolific writer, but the good quality and voluminous quantity of his lectures and general conversation had quite an effect on people. He much preferred talk at Inklings meetings to readings and is recorded by fellow Inkling Christopher Tolkien as "lying on the couch, and lolling and shouting and saying, 'Oh God, not another elf!'" during The Lord of the Rings. Dyson was hardly alone in his distaste for Tolkien's stories, and eventually Tolkien quit reading from them to the group altogether. Actually, it seems from the letters of C.S. Lewis that Dyson was considered the most fun-loving of the Inklings, and Warnie Lewis liked him best of all.

Dairyu Michael Wenger is a Sōtō Zen priest and current Dean of Buddhist Studies at the San Francisco Zen Center (SFZC) in San Francisco, California—where he has been a member since 1972. A Dharma heir of Sojun Mel Weitsman, Wenger is also a former president of the SFZC. He received his M.A. from The New School in New York, New York.