Which C.S. Lewis book recounts his grief after Joy Davidman’s death?

The story behind the answer

A Grief Observed recounts C.S. Lewis’s grief after the death of Joy Davidman. The book was published in 1961 under the pseudonym N.W. Clerk.

Written as a series of intense reflections, the work examines bereavement, anger, doubt, prayer, and the difficulty of reconciling suffering with belief. Lewis’s language is notably personal and unsettled, making the book different in tone from his more systematic apologetic works.

Readers sometimes confuse it with The Problem of Pain, which was published in 1940 and presents a theological discussion of suffering rather than a memoir of bereavement. Surprised by Joy is also autobiographical, but it focuses mainly on Lewis’s intellectual and spiritual development before his marriage to Davidman.

Source: Wikipedia · fact-checked Sept. 2026

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