The Four Loves collects C.S. Lewis’s discussion of affection, friendship, erotic love, and charity.
Published in 1960, the book develops ideas first presented in a 1958 BBC radio talk series. Lewis examines four Greek terms commonly used to distinguish kinds of love: storge for natural affection, philia for friendship, eros for romantic or sexual love, and agape or charity for self-giving love.
Lewis does not treat these categories as completely isolated. He argues that natural human loves can be valuable while also becoming possessive or destructive when they are treated as ultimate. The book therefore combines literary examples, Christian theology, and observations about ordinary relationships.
A frequent mistake is to identify The Four Loves as a novel or autobiography. It is a work of Christian reflection. Its title also does not mean that Lewis claimed only four emotional experiences exist; it refers to four traditional categories used to explore human love.