Bruce Edwards
Professor of English and Associate Dean for Distance Education and International Programs at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio, where he has been a faculty member and administrator since 1981. He has served as Fulbright Fellow in Nairobi, Kenya (1999-2000), a Bradley Research Fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC (1989-90), and as the S. W. Brooks Memorial Professor of Literature at The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia (1988). Bruce and his wife, Joan, live in Bowling Green, and have four grown children, ranging in age from 19 to 28.

Bruce has published two books on Lewis, including A Rhetoric of Reading: C. S. Lewis's Defense of Western Literacy and The Taste of the Pineapple: Essays on C. S. Lewis as Reader, Critic, and Imaginative Writer. He is also a contributor to many collections of essays about Lewis and the Inklings (most recently in The C S Lewis Readers Encyclopedia and Reading with C. S. Lewis). For many years he has maintained a popular web site on the life and works of C. S. Lewis.

Nigel Goodwin
Graduate of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art; Founder of the London Arts Centre Group; and Executive Director of Genesis Arts Trust, a worldwide ministry to visual and performing artists.

The Rev. Richard Belser
Rector, St. Michael's Episcopal Church, Charleston, SC. He has previously served churches in Fort Mill, Columbia, and Johns Island. He is a graduate of Washington and Lee University and Virginia Theological Seminary.

David Payne
David Payne was born in West London, England, about 40 miles from the home of C.S. Lewis. In 1991, having been in marketing most of his life, he left his native UK for Nashville, Tennessee. That’s when his dramatic links with Lewis began in earnest. In 1992, the Circle Players, Nashville’s foremost community theatre company, announced auditions for its production of Shadowlands. Though Payne only went along hoping for a small part, he was cast as C.S. Lewis.

Director, Sylvia Boyd, observed, “When I cast David in the lead role, I little realized what an incredible journey it would be. He had never been on the stage before, yet his portrayal of Lewis astonished me by its power, sensitivity and authenticity. I had the feeling that we had found the real C.S. Lewis!”

Today, Payne’s dramatic performances, which are based almost entirely upon or inspired by the writings of C. S. Lewis, take him all over the US and the UK. Apart from his three one-man shows, he regularly tours as Lewis in Shadowlands, and Aslan in The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe and The Magician’s Nephew.

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As Charles Colson Professor of Faith & Culture at Union University, Jackson, TN, Dr. Hal Poe is charged with developing this newly created professorship, writing and teaching across the disciplines, engaging the culture with the gospel from as many perspectives as possible, and mentoring other faculty to understand how their disciplines relate to the Christian faith.

Poe earned his B.A. degree at the University of South Carolina, and his M.Div. and Ph.D. at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Among other community and professional involvements, he is the President of the Edgar Allen Poe Museum and Foundation of Richmond, Virginia, on the editorial board of The Christian Scholar’s Review, a board member of the Jackson Symphony, a member of the Board of Trustees of the C.S. Lewis Foundation as well as Program Director of the C.S. Lewis Summer Institute, Oxbridge 2002 and 2005.