Regular marked price: $11.95Discount Price: $9.56
Cost Savings: $2.39 (20%)Price fluctuation possible.
How soon does it ship: Normal ship time within one day
Shipping? Absolutely FREE if you qualify for Super Saver Shipping.
Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 242.4
EAN num: 9780060652388
ISBN number: 0060652381
Label: HarperOne
Manufacturer: HarperOne
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 112
Printing Date: February 01, 2001
Publishing house: HarperOne
Release Date: February 06, 2001
Sale Popularity Level: 4280
Studio: HarperOne
Other books you might be interested in perusing:
Editor's Notes and Comments:
Product Description:
Written after his wife's tragic death as a way of surviving the 'mad midnight moment,' A Grief Observed is C.S. Lewis's honest reflection on the fundamental issues of life, death, and faith in the midst of loss. This work contains his concise, genuine reflections on that period: 'Nothing will shake a man -- or at any rate a man like me -- out of his merely verbal thinking and his merely notional beliefs. He has to be knocked silly before he comes to his senses. Only torture will bring out the truth. Only under torture does he discover it himself.' This is a beautiful and unflinchingly homest record of how even a stalwart believer can lose all sense of meaning in the universe, and how he can gradually regain his bearings.
Amazon.com Review:
C.S. Lewis joined the human race when his wife, Joy Gresham, died of cancer. Lewis, the Oxford don whose Christian apologetics make it seem like he's got an answer for everything, experienced crushing doubt for the very first time after his wife's tragic death. A Grief Observed contains his epigrammatic reflections on that period: 'Your bid--for God or no God, for a good God or the Cosmic Sadist, for eternal life or nonentity--will not be serious if nothing much is staked on it. And you will never discover how serious it was until the stakes are raised horribly high,' Lewis writes. 'Nothing will shake a man--or at any rate a man like me--out of his merely verbal thinking and his merely notional beliefs. He has to be knocked silly before he comes to his senses. Only torture will bring out the truth. Only under torture does he discover it himself.' This is the book that inspired the film Shadowlands, but it is more wrenching, more revelatory, and more real than the movie. It is a beautiful and unflinchingly honest record of how even a stalwart believer can lose all sense of meaning in the universe, and how he can gradually regain his bearings. --Michael Joseph Gross
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers -
Not every author invites readers into the intimacy of his own most personal and profound loss. But not every confirmed bachelour and university professor marries for immigration rather than for love, and later realizes that his heart belongs to the person to whom he is already married, only to formally take her as a real wife during her hospitalization and treatment for a form of cancer that will eventually end her life. But C.S. Lewis is special, and so are his readers.
This personal diary, originally published under a psedonym, offers reassurance that knowing God is good does not preclude feelings of deep sorrow, fear, and uncertainty in the loss of a loved one. Lewis explores the social, emotional, and spiritual earthquakes that are caused by the death of his wife. Losing his intellectual sparring partner, his bedfellow, his friend, and his lover shakes him to the core, yet he clings to Christ as the only source of eteral hope for himself and for his wife Joy.
During a season of grief, I read this book every few weeks. It's a classic and not to be missed, not because it's entertaining, but because it acknowleges deep longings and desires that are intended by our Creator to lead us to Truth.
Rated by buyers -
CS Lewis looks death into the face; he does not flinch and does not console himself with platitudes. He had lost the love of his life and his pain is palpable to the reader. This is a raw and honest book but it is not at all depressing: At the end of the book, Lewis begins to recover: his wish is simply that, on his own death bed, his lover will come back to him and give him the consolation of seeing her face again.
Rather surpisingly, I was diagnosed with terminal cancer myself three weeks after doing this review. The Lord gives, the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord! If you read this, say a prayer for me that I may die with courage and joy!
Rated by buyers 
-
Lost a child. C. S. asks me to work very hard. I can't do it. Kushner gets to the heart of grief.
Rated by buyers -
This book obviously already has plenty of praising views, but I read this book and found it so great that I can't live with myself if I don't write a review. Coming from a kid who grieved a traumatic death, this book *IS* the book to buy if you're grieving, want to understand death, or want to find a book to help out a confused friend (no matter what age) who's grieving. It's worth the price.
Rated by buyers -
I am new to the genius of CS Lewis. I read the Narnia series as a kid, but have not read books for years, until recently. This book was deep, and full of the genius Lewis is known for. He expresses the pain of losing his wife, and the questions that those who mourn often work through, but are too guilty to express publically. The work is awesome, and may help some who are going through similar feelings of greif. Skip the aknowlegement at the beginning by Madeline Engle, I am not familiar with her writing, but have heard the name. I am surprised she was chosen to write the aknowlegement, but it is an amusing contrast to Lewis' intellect and spiritual understanding. The aknowlegement exudes an attitude of confidence in spiritual issues, yet reveals a cluelessness and spiritual blindess found largely in todays new age books. It does not belong in a CS Lewis book.
Find other books like this one:
