Which C.S. Lewis book was published in 1960 as a study of love’s four forms?

C.S. Lewis’s book The Four Loves was published in 1960 as a study of four forms of human affection. It grew out of a BBC radio series and examines affection, friendship, erotic love, and charity through literary, philosophical, and Christian reflection.

The four terms are storge, philia, eros, and agape. Lewis discusses them as overlapping but distinguishable kinds of love rather than as a simple ladder of emotional importance. His treatment combines everyday observations with ideas drawn from classical language and Christian theology.

The book is sometimes reduced to a list of four Greek words, but Lewis’s argument is broader. He considers how love can become possessive, how friendship differs from romance, and how human affection can be transformed by charitable love. His examples also show that the categories are not sealed compartments.

The Four Loves belongs to Lewis’s nonfiction rather than his fiction. It appeared after works such as The Problem of Pain and Mere Christianity, and it is separate from Till We Have Faces, whose plot is built around a retelling of the Cupid-and-Psyche story.