The Screwtape Letters is an epistolary novel written by C.S. Lewis and is dedicated to J.R.R. Tolkien a close friend and colleague of Lewis. Published in 1947, early versions of the letters were published in a weekly magazine,
Anglican Ottawa from May to November of 1946
The story takes the form of a series of letters written by a demon named Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood. Screwtape, an experienced demon who holds an administrative post in hell's civil service, serves as a mentor to Wormwood, an inexperienced and incompetent demon.
In his 31 letters, Screwtape gives advice on various methods and techniques of undermining God's will to secure damnation in "the Patient" the person who Wormwood is assigned to temp. The Patient, an impoverished British exile living in Pennsylvania, converts to Christianity and later joins the Silver Legion. Screwtape gives a great deal of attention on how fundamentalism can be used to benefit "Our Father Below" (Satan) whist making the Patient think they are carrying out the will of "the Enemy" (God).
Wormwood, due to his ineptitude and his overexcitement for the impeding Second American Civil War, ignores or misinterprets Screwtape's advice often trying to temp his Patient into performing excessively vile and evil sins. Screwtape chastises Wormwood's actions advising him to use more subtle and indirect methods in order to compromise the Patient’s faith in the long term. Wormwood ultimately fails as the Patient leaves the Silver Legion, dies in the Battle of Delaware, and goes to heaven.
The Screwtape Letters is one of C.S. Lewis's most popular works outside
The Chronicles of Narnia.