The last temptation

Kazantzakis's classic novel, blacklisted by the Vatican, filmed by Scorsese, has been labelled heretical, blasphemous, and also a masterpiece. His Christ is an epic conception, wholly original. 'When Kazantzakis describes the raising of Lazarus, the early life of Mary Magdalene, the domestic lives of Martha and Mary, it is as if an old box of lantern slides had suddenly become a moving picture. The author has achieved a new and moving interpretation of a truly human Christ.' Times Literary Supplement