The Screwtape Letters

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The classic battle between good and evil, told from evil’s viewpoint. This is definitely a book to read with a pen in hand.
I was absolutely astounded at Lewis’ insights. For instance, how did he know that truths from the bible have been withheld by men? That is not a widely known truth. There were a small number of suggestions in the book with which I did not agree. For instance, that Satan can “hear” our silent prayers. I personally think Satan is banned from knowing our thoughts. But, for the most part, Lewis nails human frailty and weakness uncomfortably on the head. The reader, if humble and astute, can learn so much about themselves and about Satan’s evil tactics from this book.
I thought it screamed “eternal truth” in Chapter 22 when Screwtape was SO furious that Wormwood had allowed his “patient” to fall in love. Satan is furious when love creates a happy family. As we look at our world today, we see the results of Satan’s unrelenting and successful attack on the family.
Though he lived long before such things were invented, Lewis prophesied the use of photo shop, Internet and pornography. “We have engineered a great increase in the license which society allows to the representation of the apparent nude (not the real nude) in art, and its exhibition on the stage or the bathing beach. It is all a fake, of course; the figures in the popular art are falsely drawn; the real women in bathing suits or tights are actually pinched in and propped up to make them appear firmer and more slender and more boyish that nature allow a full-grown woman to be. . . As a result we are more and more directing desires of men to something which does not exist- making the role of the eye in sexuality more and more important and at the same time making its demands more and more impossible. What follows you can easily forecast!”

When asked why he didn’t write a sequel to this book, C. S. Lewis answered, "The world into which I had to project myself while I spoke through Screwtape was all dust, grit, thirst and itch. Every trace of beauty, freshness and geniality had to be excluded. It almost smothered me before I was done. It would have smothered my readers if I had prolonged it."
And one of my favorite quotes of warning:
“Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one--the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts,...Your affectionate uncle, Screwtape.”




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