Which C.S. Lewis book presents a senior demon’s advice on tempting a human?

The Screwtape Letters presents a senior demon’s advice on tempting a human. C.S. Lewis wrote the book as a series of fictional letters from Screwtape, an experienced tempter, to his inexperienced nephew Wormwood.

The patient, the human being under temptation, is never named. This perspective lets Lewis satirize demonic bureaucracy while reversing the usual viewpoint of moral instruction: readers hear how evil might analyze distraction, pride, resentment, and spiritual complacency.

The letters first appeared in the Anglican newspaper The Guardian in 1941, and the collected book was published that year. Lewis later wrote the work quickly and found the process unpleasant because of its sustained negative viewpoint.

Although the book is often categorized as Christian apologetics, it is also satire and imaginative fiction. Its fictional demons do not provide a systematic theology of temptation; instead, their cynical advice exposes recognizable weaknesses in ordinary human behavior.