Written by Clive Staples Lewis in longhand in notebooks that Lewis found in his home, A Grief Observed probes the “mad midnight moments” of Lewis’s mourning the loss of his wife to cancer, moments in which he questioned what he had previously believed about life and death, marriage, and even God.
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From the foreword:
“I am grateful, too, to Lewis for having the courage to yell,
to doubt, to kick at God with angry violence.
This is part of a healthy grief not often encouraged.
It is helpful indeed that C.S. Lewis,
who has been such a successful apologist for Christianity,
should have the courage to admit doubt about
what he has so superbly proclaimed.
It gives us permission to admit our own doubts,
our own angers and anguishes,
and to know that they are part of the soul’s growth.”
Madeleine L’Engle, A Grief Observed
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“I had yet to learn that all human relationships end in pain—
it is the price that our imperfection
has allowed Satan to exact from us for the privilege of love.”
C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed
“We were promised sufferings. They were part of the program.
We were even told, ‘Blessed are they that mourn,’ and I accept it.
I’ve got nothing that I hadn’t bargained for.
Of course, it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others,
and in reality, not imagination.”
C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed
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“And grief still feels like fear. Perhaps, more importantly, like suspense.
Or like waiting; just hanging about waiting for something to happen.”
“For in grief nothing ‘stays put.’
One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs.”
“And no one ever told me about the laziness of grief.”
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“Aren’t all these notes the senseless writhings of a man who won’t accept the fact
that there is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it?
Who still thinks there is some device (if only he could find it)
which will make pain not to be pain.
It doesn’t really matter whether you grip the arms of the dentist’s chair
or let your hands lie in your lap. The drill drills on.”
C S Lewis, A Grief Observed