Screwtape chastises his nephew for allowing his Patient any real pleasures, since they would expose the fake pleasures as a temptation.Īt this point, Screwtape tries to explain the difference between God and Devil's views on humans - while the Devil and his demons see the humans as food, Screwtape tells his nephew that God actually loves the humans and wants them to come to Heaven with him. Wormwood fails again when the Patient takes a walk by himself and reads a good book. Wormwood shows some success when he introduces the Patient to a group of pretentious and superficial new friends who Screwtape hopes will corrupt him. When World War II breaks out, he warns Wormwood not to get carried away by his enjoyment of the war, but to use the Patient's anxiety to his advantage. Screwtape then instructs his nephew to keep trying to break his faith, and also try to build up his estrangement from his mother. Screwtape obliges, instructing him to keep the young man confused and stop him from believing in God (or, as the demons refer to him, 'The Enemy.') Wormwood fails when his Patient has a spiritual awakening and starts attending church. The correspondence begins when the younger demon Wormwood is assigned as a tempter to a young Englishman, his first 'patient.' He writes to his uncle for advice. The safest road to Hell is the gradual one, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts. He instructs his nephew on how to tempt, manipulate and torment their human 'patients', to ultimately bring them to hell. The book consists of Screwtape writing letters to his nephew, Wormwood, a demon-in-training. But like a stereotypical bureaucrat or businessman, he is humorless, greedy and obsessed with details and concerned only with his own success. He boasts that his career as a demon has been 'one of unbroken success.' He is also a parody of a high-ranking British bureaucrat, as Lewis explains, 'my vision of Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state, or the offices of a thoroughly nasty business concern.' So as demons are known to be, Screwtape is ruthless, cruel, deceptive and manipulative.

He is an elder demon and a prominent authority in Hell, the undersecretary of an unnamed department. Screwtape is the main protagonist and antagonist of C.S.

~ Screwtape, signing off each of his letters. You could just leave the article without pictures, but really now. The Joker believes this article is lacking a certain flair.

The screwtape