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    The Screwtape Letters
    The Screwtape Letters
    The Screwtape Letters
    Ebook78 pages1 hour

    The Screwtape Letters

    By C. S. Lewis

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    "The Screwtape Letters" is an epistolary satire by C.S. Lewis, wherein the whole plot of temptation and moral conflict in a series of letters is written between the senior demon Screwtape to his novice nephew Wormwood. In their correspondence, Lewis exposes not only the nature of human faith but even the subtleties of human sin and spiritual battles that besiege men. Hilarious and profound all at once, it shows just how easily one can be derailed from virtue. Above all, it provides a powerful reflection on the obstacles to a life of faithfulness.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherGlobal Publishers
    Release dateNov 8, 2024
    ISBN9781916700567
    Author

    C. S. Lewis

    Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963) was one of the intellectual giants of the twentieth century and arguably one of the most influential writers of his day. He was a Fellow and Tutor in English Literature at Oxford University until 1954, when he was unanimously elected to the Chair of Medieval and Renaissance Literature at Cambridge University, a position he held until his retirement. He wrote more than thirty books, allowing him to reach a vast audience, and his works continue to attract thousands of new readers every year. His most distinguished and popular accomplishments include Out of the Silent Planet, The Great Divorce, The Screwtape Letters, and the universally acknowledged classics The Chronicles of Narnia. To date, the Narnia books have sold over 100 million copies and have been transformed into three major motion pictures. Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963) fue uno de los intelectuales más importantes del siglo veinte y podría decirse que fue el escritor cristiano más influyente de su tiempo. Fue profesor particular de literatura inglesa y miembro de la junta de gobierno en la Universidad Oxford hasta 1954, cuando fue nombrado profesor de literatura medieval y renacentista en la Universidad Cambridge, cargo que desempeñó hasta que se jubiló. Sus contribuciones a la crítica literaria, literatura infantil, literatura fantástica y teología popular le trajeron fama y aclamación a nivel internacional. C. S. Lewis escribió más de treinta libros, lo cual le permitió alcanzar una enorme audiencia, y sus obras aún atraen a miles de nuevos lectores cada año. Sus más distinguidas y populares obras incluyen Las Crónicas de Narnia, Los Cuatro Amores, Cartas del Diablo a Su Sobrino y Mero Cristianismo.

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    Reviews for The Screwtape Letters

    4/5

    2,846 ratings76 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Entertaining (there's some sharp social commentary), and I found having to reverse the psychology, as it were, a useful intellectual exercise that worked my brain nicely (and, I think, helped me get the theological points Lewis was making). My copy ends with a "Screwtape Proposes a Toast," which I found *quite* tedious, unfortunately. Well worth a read, even if you're disinclined (as I am) to take the religious aspects.... religiously. *looks askance at LW3*
    • 2/5
      A creative look into how the demonic works in the lives of Christians. This book reiterated the fact that we don't always smack right into sinful things--if so, we'd recognize sin more often and say no from the beginning. More often than not, sinful things begin with a little attitude, a little grievance, something small...and fester and grow into something big. How unfortunate that a sinful thought would just need a tiny seed--that we are so willing to water, when a pure and holy thought needs God's constant reminding and coaxing and prodding in us for us to allow it to flourish. Praise God that he does remind us and coax us and prod us--he really does deeply love us all!
    • 4/5
      A one sided conversation between Wormwood and "Your affectionate Uncle Screwtape." Screwtape responds to letters written by Wormwood, we never see the letters the nephew has written. This book is very well written and surprisingly is still relevant today, especially towards the end with some of Screwtapes comments.
    • 4/5
      Excellent book on how a devil is trying to think how to fool humans. This leads to great little sermonettes in the form of letters.
    • 5/5
      It is a very clever take on spiritual warfare. I like the matter of fact approach to the concept of demons. C.S. Lewis even has a bit of fun at his own expense, with the demon encouraging his underling to have the human quote more Lewis, and spend less time studying the Bible.
    • 4/5
      An entertaining counter factual account of the Christian life. Some of the arguments are a bit beyond me, but the basics are sound. Makes the reader contemplate the real meaning of being a true Christian.
    • 1/5
       Boring. Boring and moralistic. Boring and moralistic and designed to help us improve ourselves.
    • 5/5
      This book is part of my C.S. Lewis collection. I went through a huge phase where I was just obsessed with anything and everything by him. While I don't agree with all of his theology, I do love his writing style and the things he has to say about faith. He was a good one.
    • 4/5
      I came to this work expecting it to be a clever yet annoying apologetic for Mr. Lewis' vision of Christianity. While it is an apologia, it's remarkably fun listening. Mr. Lewis puts into Screwtape's letters some things he probably couldn't have gotten away with in a different format. I'm not sure, but it certainly seems like there were some very direct personal jabs in "Screwtape's" letters. Much to my surprise, there is a whole lot of really juicy insights into human psychology and the human condition here. Even when I disagree with his conclusions (most of the time) I have to admire his insights.

      I also have to admire his rhetorical skills. For all that I disagree with him, I wouldn't want to debate him. The man is damn good at constructing a logical argument.

      If I were a younger person, and had been raised in Mr. Lewis' variety of Christianity, I probably would have loved this work. I imagine a lot of liberal Christians take great comfort in Mr. Lewis's implicit contention that loveing Christianity is objectively true. I can see why this work has stayed so popular for so long.

      Weirdly enough, this felt less directly didactic than his Narnia books. Then again, I read the Narnia series expecting a fantasy adventure story. If I had expected it to be apologetics in fantasy form I might have felt less beaten by the metaphor hammer.

      I am very likely to re-read this one. While "simply" a series of letters, what Screwtapes includes and excludes from his letters shapes a story with a lot of depth and complexity. Aside from that, this is worth examining for the quality and depth of the rhetorical/argumentation skills displayed. I think I can learn alot about constructing persuasive arguments from this work.
    • 5/5
      Sometimes I hold off on reviewing "classics" because everyone tells me how danged "classic" they are and I tend to not trust things that are "popular." So, the long wait (my whole life) before I finally read C. S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters and the appended "Screwtape Proposes a Toast."

      Wow! It is good. It is, despite some dated references in a dated setting, still relevant to present-day mankind and their souls. The story is so well-known, and so easily findable on Wikipedia and the like, that I won't give any sort of recap. A million other reviewers have praised this work's virtues, so I will just say that Lewis's take on how and why mankind could be tempted to hellfire is brilliant.

      As I said, still relevant too. I will give a few examples of Lewis's prescient warnings and insights. In "Screwtape Proposes a Toast" he derides the educational system.

      "At universities, examinations must be framed so that nearly all the students get good marks. Entrance examinations must be framed so that all, or nearly all, citizens can go to universities, whether they have any power (or wish) to profit from higher education or not. At schools, children who are too stupid of lazy to learn languages and mathematics and elementary science can be set to doing things that children used to do in their spare time. Let them, for example, make mud pies and call it modelling." (pp. 125-126)

      How familiar does that sound? The dumbing down of our educational system? The rampant student loan debt because everybody MUST go to college!

      Or on the pitfalls of democracy. Democracy as in everyone is equal, which is how the demons want to define it. "..they [the humans] should never be allowed to give this word a clear and definable meaning." Why? Teach man that instead of all men being created equal, and how every man is equal before the law, the government, and God, no, falsely teach man that "all men are equal" (p. 122, emphasis in the original). Why? "As a result you can use the word democracy to sanction in his thought the most degrading (and also the least enjoyable) of all human feelings. You can get him to practise, not only without shame but with a positive glow of self-approval, conduct which, if undefended by the magic word, would be universally derided." (p. 122).

      Does that not sound like the decline of Western thought and values in a nutshell? "We are all equal! All the same! Democracy! So do what everyone else is doing!" Or, to give it a socialist tinge, which is what Lewis mainly meant I think. You would not steal another man's property as a burglar, but call it a tax to pull down the rich so all men are at the same level! Democracy!

      A classic, and rightly so. Highly recommended.

      Reviewed ISBN 0684831171. Two prefaces by the author included.
    • 4/5
      This short little book (160 pages)took me 5 days to read. That isn't because I wasn't interested but I found I had to read some passages two or three times to grasp what Lewis was saying. At other times his writing was very easy to understand and I enjoyed his sense of humour.

      The idea of the book is that a senior devil, Screwtape, is giving pointers to a junior devil, Wormwood (you have to love the names given to the devils), about how to encourage a young English man to sin in order that his soul will belong to the devil upon his death. The time is during the Second World War and this young man has recently started attending church. For a while it looks like Wormwood will succeed as the young man falls in with a crowd who are "thoroughly reliable people; steady, consistent scoffers and wordlings who without any particular crimes are progressing quietly and comfortably towards" Hell (our Father's house as Screwtape refers to it). Then the young man falls in love with a Christian woman ("...such a Christian--a vile, sneaking, simpering, demure, monosyllabic, bread-and-butter miss") and the plans start to unravel. Screwtape gets so exasperated with Wormwood at one point that he turns into a large centipede.

      As the book proceeds a clear picture of the struggle between good and evil is drawn. "It does not matter how small the sins provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into Nothing. Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick. Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one--the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts."

      C.S. Lewis was an atheist who converted while at college and described himself as "the most dejected and reluctant convert in all of England". That may be but he went on to write some wonderful books that illuminate thoughts decades later. If you ignore the references to the Germans the time could almost be now with war in Iraq and Afghanistan and many other places. Even if you are an atheist (or an agnostic as I am) you can't help but worry about where our world is headed. As another Englishman, Edmund Burke, said "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing."
    • 4/5
      enjoyed it although it was hard for me to get through it
    • 4/5
      Always a good read with insight into temptation and the human condition.
    • 4/5
      I don't consider myself a particularly religious person, but I enjoyed The Screwtape Letter immensely. It has a lot of great observations on life and what it means to be a person that can be enjoyed by everyone, not just the Christians or prospective Christians that Lewis was writing towards.

      Favorite quote:

      "All mortals tend to turn into the thing they are pretending to be. This is elementary."
    • 4/5
      A very good book for all those who want to understand, or to embark on a journey of spirituality. Many books have been written from the perspective of God, but not too many have been written from the perspective of demons.

      As an alternative manner of thought, it provides a delightful read, and poses many questions for us to think about
    • 3/5
      I've put this on my shelf to re-read in print. Not all books can be thoughtfully processed while driving. It was not dense, but the style, a one-sided correspondence, brooked no distraction. I don't believe in the devil, and the depiction of the bureaucracy devoted to his service was comical. The insight into man's behavior and faith, and how they might be manipulated, and are in fact constantly manipulated by the forces of good and evil, was cogent to the point of discomfort at times. Will be looking for a copy at a book sale.
    • 4/5
      In a series of letters to his nephew, Wormwood, the demon Screwtape provides advice to his nephew on how to tempt an unnamed human and separate him from the Enemy that is God.

      An interesting approach that is both a good read and prompts some serious thought on any believer's relationship with God.
    • 4/5
      A striking approach to literature about the devil, sin and evil in the world. The Screwtape Letters is a satirical Christian apologetics novel written in epistolary style by C. S. Lewis, first published in book form in February 1942. The story takes the form of a series of letters from a senior demon, Screwtape, to his nephew, a junior "tempter" named Wormwood, so as to advise him on methods of securing the damnation of a British man, known only as "the Patient". C.S. Lewis provides a series of lessons in the importance of taking a deliberate role in living out Christian faith by portraying a typical human life, with all its temptations and failings, as seen from devils' viewpoints. Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to Wormwood, the inexperienced tempter. In the body of the thirty-one letters which make up the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and promoting sin in the Patient, interspersed with observations on human nature and Christian doctrine. While it resonates I did not find it compelling, merely entertaining at its best moments.
    • 3/5
      "Junior tempter" Wormwood receives excellent instruction in the art and science of ensnaring an unsuspecting human soul in this epistolary theological classic.

      Wormwood's human "patient", a young British man living through the dark days of World War II, is a new Christian. Wormwood's Uncle Screwtape believes that despite this man's conversion, he could still be brought back into Satan's camp through the proper combination of trying circumstances and demonic manipulation. To this end, the old devil tutors his protege in the exploitation of human weaknesses, such as gluttony, lust and pride.

      Some find Screwtape's letters witty, even humorous, but I found this short book heavy going at times.
    • 4/5
      Nothing like reading the Screwtape Letters to renew to see how fickle we are and how much we need to approach one another with a good dose of humility and forgiveness. I typically read it once a decade as a reminder.
    • 1/5
      I'm really not sure what the author was going for but this was not fun to read. It was not funny or clever or even especially original. There was a point when I though Lewis was going to use a plot twist to improve the story (when Screwtape start apologizing for his excessive language) but that patched itself up too nicely.

      There was really no conflict or antagonist (or even protagonist, for that matter). All in all it was a dull book that came of more like a poor man's sermon than viable literature. Truly disappointing!
    • 5/5
      A subtle and profound exploration of the nature and causes of sins, reflecting a lifetime of thinking about the subject by a powerful intellect. Interesting even to this atheist.
    • 5/5
      A truly phenomenal study. I thoroughly enjoyed this one.
    • 4/5
      "The Screwtape Letters" was interesting, challenging, clever, and funny.

      Each short chapter is a letter written by devil/demon Screwtape, sent to his nephew, Wormwood, regarding the latter's work. The nephew has a human he is supposed to protect from becoming a Christian, but doesn't do a good job of it despite his uncle's advice and suggestions.

      I wasn't sure about this book at first: it sat on my shelves for probably ten years, unread. As I read each chapter, I began to see how well the author described humans and their nature, and used that knowledge to create an amusing little book about how people think, react, and justify themselves. It doesn't whitewash how those who consider themselves Christians don't always act in a Christian manner, either.

      The additional material at the end, "Screwtape Proposes a Toast", was marvelous. C.S. Lewis just nails human nature as it truly exists.

      This book is recommended for all, religious or non-religious.
    • 5/5
      Oh the cunning of Satan and his evil minions. Lewis helps us see a large host of ways in which those little buggers can get at us and hopefully helps us be wiser to evil influence!
    • 4/5
      I really liked this book overall, but I would have liked it even more if it weren't for Lewis's doctrinal differences. The major difference is that Lewis apparently believed people could lose their salvation. This belief drives the plot of the book. (The devils are trying to get the Christians to lose their salvation.)
    • 2/5
      I think that maybe as a non-Christian I missed a lot of the subtleties and enjoyment this book had to offer. I feel like I read it in a glazed-over state where nothing really penetrated or stuck with me. That said, it wasn't horrible.
    • 5/5
      what a reflection! shows how easily we are manipulated into wrongdoing.
    • 5/5
      The Screwtape Letters was a really great story. It was insightful and convicting all the while being entertaining.
      Right off the bat, the unusual perspective had me hooked. A story about good, told from the perspective of evil; it's not something I would have ever thought of myself. Tucked between moments that made me laugh were also convicting reminders and insights on how sin finds its way into my life. I will definitely keep this book on my list of recommended reading.
    • 5/5
      “The Screwtape Letters” was my first foray into the mind of C. S. Lewis and I found it interesting and timeless. Written at the height of WWII in 1942, Lewis’s warnings about the false hope and change of “social justice” and “self-esteem” (then referred to as parity of esteem) have unfortunately become fulfilled predictions. In “Screwtape Proposes a Toast” (added twenty years later) Lewis again points to the then (1962) disturbing trend of everyone being equal, this despite obvious and significant differences. No one can be – or at least can be thought of as being – better than another, and he goes on to reinforce the notion that salvation of Democracies (free people) lies in the salvation of the individual – not the collective.
      A very refreshing, enlightening and timeless read.

    Book preview

    The Screwtape Letters - C. S. Lewis

    cover.jpg

    THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS

    by

    C. S. LEWIS Fellow of Magdalen College,

    Oxford

    TO J. R. R. TOLKIEN

    The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn.—Luther

    The devill . . the prowde spirite . . cannot endure to be mocked.—Thomas More

    Copyright © 2024

    All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission request, write to the publisher, addressed Attention: Permissions Coordinator, at the address below.

    Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Names, characters, and places are products of the author’s imagination.

    Printed by Amazon.

    Contents

    I

    II

    III

    IV

    V

    VI

    VII

    VIII

    X

    XV

    XVII

    XVIII

    XIX

    XXV

    XXVIII

    XXIX

    XXX

    XXXI

    PREFACE

    I HAVE no intention of explaining how the correspondence which I now offer to the public fell into my hands.

    There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight. The sort of script which is used in this book can be very easily obtained by anyone who has once learned the knack; but disposed or excitable people who might make a bad use of it shall not learn it from me.

    Readers are advised to remember that the devil is a liar. Not everything that Screwtape says should be assumed to be true even from his own angle. I have made no attempt to identify any of the human beings mentioned in the letters; but I think it very unlikely that the portraits, say, of Fr. Spike or the patient’s mother, are wholly just. There is wishful thinking in Hell as well as on Earth.

    In conclusion, I ought to add that no effort has been made to clear up the chronology of the letters. Number XVII appears to have been composed before rationing became serious; but in general the diabolical method of dating seems to bear no relation to terrestrial time and I have not attempted to reproduce it. The history of the European War, except in so far as it happens now and then to impinge upon the spiritual condition of one human being, was obviously of no interest to Screwtape.

    C. S. LEWIS

    MAGDALEN COLLEGEJuly 5, 1941

    I

    MY DEAR WORMWOOD,

    I note what you say about guiding our patient’s reading and taking care that he sees a good deal of his materialist friend. But are you not being a trifle naïf? It sounds as if you supposed that argument was the way to keep him out of the Enemy’s clutches. That might have been so if he had lived a few centuries earlier. At that time the humans still knew pretty well when a thing was proved and when it was not; and if it was proved they really believed it. They still connected thinking with doing and were prepared to alter their way of life as the result of a chain of reasoning. But what with the weekly press and other such weapons we have largely altered that. Your man has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to have a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn’t think of doctrines as primarily true of false, but as academic or practical, outworn or contemporary, conventional or ruthless. Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don’t waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong, or stark, or courageous—that it is the philosophy of the future. That’s the sort of thing he cares about.

    The trouble about argument is that it moves the whole struggle onto the Enemy’s own ground. He can argue too; whereas in really practical propaganda of the kind I am suggesting He has been shown for centuries to be greatly the inferior of Our Father Below. By the very act of arguing, you awake the patient’s reason; and once it is awake, who can foresee the result? Even if a particular train of thought can be twisted so as to end in our favour, you will find that you have been strengthening in your patient the fatal habit of attending to universal issues and withdrawing his attention from the stream of immediate sense experiences. Your business is to fix his attention on the stream. Teach him to call it real life and don’t let him ask what he means by real.

    Remember, he is not, like you, a pure spirit. Never having been a human (Oh that abominable advantage of the Enemy’s!) you don’t realise how enslaved they are to the pressure of the ordinary. I once had a patient, a sound atheist, who used to read in the British Museum. One day, as he sat reading, I saw a train of thought in his mind beginning to go the wrong way. The Enemy, of course, was at his elbow in a moment. Before I knew where I was I saw my twenty years’ work beginning to totter. If

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