The Eagle and Child on St Giles' Street is one of the most famous literary pubs in the English-speaking world. In the 1930s and 1940s it was the regular meeting place of the Inklings — the informal literary group that included J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and others who gathered to read their work aloud and discuss it. The pub has a dedicated back room called the Rabbit Room where the group met, and a plaque commemorates their presence.
Today the Eagle and Child is a thoroughly touristy pub — but not in a bad way. The interior is genuinely old, the food is standard pub fare, and the pilgrimage quality of the visit is part of the appeal. St Giles' Street itself is worth a walk: it is one of the handsomest streets in Oxford, wide and tree-lined, with several of the university's graduate colleges and the Ashmolean at the southern end. The pub is a natural stop on a walking circuit that includes the Ashmolean and the Bodleian.