The Four Loves is C.S. Lewis’s 1956 book about friendship, affection, romantic love, and charity.
The book developed from a 1958 BBC radio series, and its title refers to four Greek terms that Lewis uses to distinguish kinds of love. Storge concerns natural affection, philia friendship, eros romantic or sexual love, and agape self-giving love, which Lewis connects with Christian charity.
Lewis does not present the four categories as sealed compartments. He examines how different loves overlap and how each can become distorted when treated as an ultimate good. His discussion moves between classical language, ordinary relationships, and Christian theology.
The Four Loves is sometimes confused with Mere Christianity or The Problem of Pain because all three are works of Christian apologetics. Unlike those books, The Four Loves focuses specifically on human relationships and the moral possibilities and dangers within them.