When reading That Hideous Strength one can’t help but wonder how C.S. Lewis could’ve written such an insightful and frighteningly realistic story about the current world over 80 years ago . In fact, however, materialistic scientism’s progressive destruction of rationality, morality, empathy and relationships was already quite far along back in 1943 when the third book in The Space Trilogy was published.

So although the book is a fictional “satire”, Lewis’ writing was based on actual events and movements that were happening or had happened. Still, the very timely plot and eerily accurate analysis of the inner thoughts of the characters feels almost prophetic if you have a limited knowledge of history, which many do. For example some people seem to think that the world has “suddenly gone mad”, but really it’s been a long slow process that recently sped up with the invention of the internet.

Such themes of eugenics, experimentation on live animals and human subjects, the use of newspaper propaganda to control the public’s perception of events that were actually created by the evil people , feminism, the attempt to live forever , the desire to become gods, and the power concentrated in the world of academia are part of this fascinating and interesting read. They cut off a man’s head and keep it alive, and their ultimate goal is to eliminate all bodily functions and even mankind altogether . They use deception to buy up land and push people off. They create a secret police and they torture people.

Along with the action is much beautifully put deep analysis of the motives and fears that drive the characters, which feels reminiscent of The Screwtape Letters.

The story is the conclusion of the first two books , but it stands on its own . I had read part one, Out of the Silent Planet, but I never finished part two , Perelandra. I found those books a little hard to read. This one is easier, I think. The series itself is the statement in story form of Lewis’ non-fiction book The Abolition of Man, as well as the basic concepts in his Mere Christianity, namely that truth exists apart from man. Man does not create truth, but he carries the knowledge of it, at least until it is conditioned out of him by scientific methods.

The plot is simple yet complex, a battle between good and evil, carried on by two different groups. The main characters are a man and wife, both atheists, who spend the whole book apart: the wife with the good team fighting the evil side that has duped and captured her gullible, ambitious husband. Being “science fiction”, it includes references to mythical beings, angels, demons and actual scientific concepts. But it’s actually more like a Christian fairy tale or a parable in my opinion. So don’t be put off by the labels “science fiction” or satire .

I highly recommend this book. It’s a captivating story about ambition, love, faith, humility, nature, spirituality that strongly cautions against and informs the reader of what’s actually going on behind the scenes in polite society and politics then and right now. The most important take away is how the characters on the side of evil became that way. I like how Lewis describes a spiritual battle of the mind. Also important, the way he portrays how words are used to deceive people, especially the common practice of talking a lot in a certain way , with big words and emotions and charisma, without actually saying anything! There’s a great scene at the end like the Tower of Babel where the evil people can’t understand each other .

But it’s past my bedtime so I will stop there. Let me know if you’ve read the book and what you think of it.