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The World's Last Night: And Other Essays

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Lewis's shorter works were generally originally composed as speeches or as articles for periodicals. Various sets of them were collected and published in book form both during his life and after his death. Trying to determine what works are in what collections is difficult - most works appear in more than one collection, some works appear under more than one title, and some collections appear under more than one title.

To aid readers, in this review I've listed the works in this collection, with notes indicating other collections they have appeared in. Where a work has appeared under more than one title, I give both titles separated by a slash.

Table of Contents:

"The Efficacy of Prayer" (1), (2)

"On Obstinacy in Belief" (2), (3), (4)

"Lilies that Fester" (2), (3), (5)

"Screwtape Proposes a Toast" (2), (4), (6)

"Good Work and Good Works" (2), (4)

"Religion and Rocketry" / "Will We Lose God in Outer Space" (1), (2)

"The World's Last Night" / "Christian Hope - Its Meaning for Today" (1), (2)

Notes:

(1) also published in "Fern-Seed and Elephants and Other Essays"

(2) also published in "Essay Collection and Other Short Pieces"

(3) also published in "They Asked for a Paper"

(4) also published in "Screwtape Proposes a Toast and Other Pieces"

(5) also published in "Christian Reunion and Other Essays"

(6) also published in "The Screwtape Letters" / "The Screwtape Letters and Screwtape Proposes a Toast"

Recommendations:

If you are interested in Lewis's shorter works, my best advice is to get "Essay Collection and Other Short Pieces", which, as of the time of this writing, is available from Amazon UK but not Amazon US. That collection consists of about 130 short works by Lewis. The works in that collection are mostly, but not exclusively, Christian.

If your interest in Lewis's shorter works is restricted to those on Christianity, and your budget or enthusiasm does not run to "Essay Collection and Other Short Pieces", then my second-best advice is to get any or all of the following (they don't overlap significantly, and between them they include most of Lewis's shorter Christian writings):

"God in the Dock - Essays on Theology and Ethics"*

"The World's Last Night and Other Essays"

"Christian Reflections"

"The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses"

* Be careful - there is a UK Fontana paperback lurking about called "God in the Dock - Essays on Theology" that is substantially shorter than the "God in the Dock - Essays on Theology and Ethics" collection. A full version of "God in the Dock - Essays on Theology and Ethics" was published in the UK under the title "Undeceptions - Essays on Theology and Ethics".

This book is a collection of various essays that C.S. Lewis authored and published a few years before his death. The titles are "The Efficacy of Prayer" (that discusses what practical, if any, effect our prayers have), "On Obstinacy in Belief" (exploring the reasons why people cling to a particular world view), "Lilies that Fester"("Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds," a talk about those whose concern is with a superficial desire to "be cultured" versus those who really care about the things that comprise culture), "Screwtape Proposes a Toast" (a short sequel to his book The Screwtape Letters), "Good Work and Good Works" (describing the difference between quality workmanship and Christian charity), "Religion and Rocketry" (discussing the truth of religion in a world where advancing technology allows humans to visit other worlds), and "The World's Last Night"(about the second coming of Christ). The essays are full of the usual vintage Lewis: shrewd, humorous, wise, and clear. In brief, they make for a fine reading time.

The World's Last Night is an education smushed into a neat, tiny, little package. Whenever I read Lewis, I am struck by his intense clarity of thought. This book is no different. Lewis is at his brightest and most lucid in these pages.

A variety of topics-from the effectiveness of prayer, to the end of the world-are covered in the pages of The World's Last Night. Each essay (and the story) is brilliant in its own way.

Lewis is one of my favorite writers. I have come to believe that I like him so much not because of his clarity or depth of thought-which are good reasons for liking him-or even because we share a distaste for modernism and all that it has done to cloud modern thought, but I believe what I appreciate most about Lewis is his sense of humor. Lewis' humor is on display in every one of these very diverse pieces. Even when I disagree with Lewis, his humor humanizes him, and I cannot hold anything against him. Contemporary authors could take a lesson from this.

Buy this book. It is worth reading and rereading. If nothing else, the humor will lift your spirits.

The World's Last Night is by no means the most comprehensive collection of Lewis' essays available and each has been published elsewhere. Nonetheless, this collection might best be described as a wonderful sampler. That is, within this compilation Lewis touches on a variety of subjects ranging from the, perhaps, more commonly contemplated questions with regard to The Efficacy of Prayer to those questions which arise due to the possibility of life on other planets as they perceivably pertain to Christianity. This collection also includes Lewis' effort to portray the battle between good and evil from the perspective of his famous character Screwtape in Screwtape Proposes a Toast. It is rounded out by essays that challenge the reader to consider the affect of government and society on Christian life at any given time. So while The World's Last Night might not be the best or most comprehensive collection of Lewis' work, it can be viewed as a comparatively cheap alternative to receive just enough variety to really whet one's appetite for a full portion of C.S. Lewis.

If you want a brief introduction to Clive Staples Lewis's thoughts on several different subjects before you attempt his array of books, then this is a good book to start. In seven essays he covers a gamut of topics-prayer, belief, culture, evil, evolution, works, life on other planets, and the Second Coming of Christ.

Being a devout Anglican, after being a devout atheist, Professor Lewis combines his teaching skills, medieval literary background and writing skills to convey a lot of theology about the nature of things in these essays. Of course, you will not agree with everything this gentleman wrote, but it should cause you to reflect upon what you believe.

Professor Lewis wrote and spoke on a number of subjects. It is very true that he was a Christian Apologist, but he was a professor of English holding the prestigious Professor of Medieval and Renaissance English at Cambridge.

He was best friends with J. R. R. Tolkien of the Lord of the Rings fame. It is a certainty that these two literary masters would sit around tossing out ideas and stories which became the foundation of their lasting popularity, even though, Tolkien did not care for the Chronicles of Narnia.

Here are three quotations from these essays:

"I have wondered before now whether the vast astronomical distances may not be God's quarantine precautions. They prevent the spiritual infection of a fallen species from spreading."

"The doctrine of the Second Coming teaches us that we do not and cannot know when the world drama will end."

"What modern Christianity find it harder to remember is that the whole of humanity in this world is also precarious, temporary, provisional."

"The World's Last Night: And Other Essays contains a number of C.S. Lewis's short essays and a Screwtape addition (I could be mistaken but I believe his wife did that one). The essay "Lillies that Fester" was interesting as it mocked the ideal of looking cultured and the Screwtape addition was pretty good (I considerably enjoyed and recommend the original book "The Screwtape Letters" as well). The most interesting essay was probably "Religion and Rocketry dealing with what might happen if life was discovered in the cosmos. The essay "The World's Last Night" deals with the Second Coming and was a good read itself. Overall an interesting collection that I recommend.

If you want to be challenged and entertained all at once, you can never do better than read C. S. Lewis. His fiction contains great theological truths, and his essays are not purely informative.

The writing of C. S. Lewis is more like poetry. It sings. It glides. It pulls you in, and moves you on. It makes you laugh in surprise. It makes you think. And once you have read a book or essay by Lewis, you never view the world the same way again.

The essays in this book are a good companion to God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics.

His essay on "The Efficacy of Prayer" is one of the best explanations of prayer I have read. There are same great quotes about religion in "Screwtape Proposes a Toast" and I believe that the ideas in "Religion and Rocketry" form the background for Lewis's Narnia series and the Space Trilogy.

If you like C. S. Lewis, you will like this book.

Excellent series of articles by CS Lewis with his usual incisive views of Christianity. Highly recommend.

I picked this book up a few years ago before I knew much about God and belief. This was a few years before I got into apologetics, theology, and philosophy. However, I 'rediscovered' it in a box of books out in my garage last week and started flipping through it. To be quite honest, I don't remember a single thing I'd read in this book a few years back but I did see my underlinings, notes, and water wear to show that I indeed had gone through it.

I started with the essay 'The Efficacy of Prayer' and I can only say, "Wow!" It really helps put some things in perspective that I have a hard time explaining to people. Indeed prayer is not a 'magic' but a 'request'.

If you can handle Lewis' prose and style of writing - which isn't hard to do for most - you will love this book. He comes at the topics in honesty and examines them quite well. To some extent I believe the essay 'The Obstinacy of Belief' is a little dated, but only for people who understand the overwhelming evidence for Christianity.

Highly recommend. You will not be let down.