The Last Temptation : The Story of Two People Who Sinned to Survive

Plot

First came The Last Temptation (1955), its title from Eliot buttressed by the paperback cover's proclamation: “The story of two people who sinned to survive”; a bestseller and book-club choice, it tells of Deborah and Victor, whose life together moves from late-Thirties Vienna to Prague and, via wartime Rome, to strife-ridden Palestine amid politicial and marital deceptions (“it was amazing what could be done with scarcely a word”); all culminates in apparent treason, and execution. In winning his pardon (Viertel had a penchant for courtroom scenes), the widow learns more than expected.