This library, with a collection of about 20,000 volumes, contains the standard works and reference books required by undergraduates for the subjects taught here, as well as several specialized collections of value mainly to graduates and faculty. The rapid growth of the library has been made possible by regular purchases and several donations, most notably from the Charles Wolfson and Margaret Thatcher Charitable Trusts. The most recent benefaction was a collection of early books by and about the Quakers from the Burford Society of Friends at their Tercentenary in 2009.

The Charles Williams Collection

This collection of books, articles, biographies and photographs has been placed on loan at CMRS by the Charles Williams Society. Charles Williams (1886-1945) was a poet, novelist and theologian who spent his working life from 1908 until his death at the Oxford University Press. With his friends C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien he was a founder member of the ‘Inklings’, a literary, philosophical and theological discussion group based in Oxford between the wars