Which 1955 memoir did C.S. Lewis write about his spiritual journey?

Surprised by Joy is C.S. Lewis’s 1955 memoir about his intellectual and spiritual journey. The book traces key experiences that shaped his movement from childhood Christianity to atheism and eventually back to Christian belief.

Lewis describes “joy” as a particular kind of intense longing rather than simple happiness. He connects that longing with books, imagination, nature, and moments of unexpected spiritual awareness. The memoir is therefore both autobiography and an account of how his ideas developed.

Lewis returned to Christianity during the early 1930s. His friendship with J.R.R. Tolkien and other Christian writers influenced his thinking, although his conversion was also the result of a longer personal process. Surprised by Joy ends before many of his best-known later works were written.

The title can be confused with A Grief Observed, which records Lewis’s experience after the death of his wife, Joy Davidman. Despite the shared word “joy,” the two books address very different periods of his life.