The Three Temptations of Guy Spenser: A Millennial Quest

THE THREE TEMPTATIONS OF GUY SPENSER is a novel about the development of a young man dealing with the complicated journey that is his life. He is the product of a comfortable, middle-class upbringing that leaves him ill prepared in a world he assumes to be his birthright as a bright, reasonably attractive American male. He eases from minimal success as a student to the subsistence existence of an adjunct professor without any plan for a future beyond his next precarious semester contract. He might have been content in that limbo forever, but a series of incidents push him into a real world replete with opportunities and pitfalls. A misunderstood and mostly innocent encounter with a coed is the catalyst for Guy Spenser being forced-bewildered and unprepared-to find another job. In a series of improbable steps, he moves from adjunct professor, to talk show host, to assistant for an aging porn star, to-finally-the discovery of his talent as an advertising executive. The novel is divided into four parts: Sloth, Vanity, Lust, and Signs, with the first three sections detailing Guy's temptations. Readers may recognize echoes of Edmund Spenser's FAERIE QUEENE as a model. The main character, Guy Spenser, is a twenty-first century pilgrim encountering updated perils faced by Guyon, the Knight of Temperance, in his quest for a perfect life. Henrik Ibsen, the Norwegian dramatist, argues that a well-constituted truth may last for as long as twenty years. After that it begins to sicken and die. What happens when the Chivalric code is applied to modern sensibility? Will any or all of the original values survive the time warp?

Richard Londraville is the author of ten books, including DESIGNER DEATH, WHAT I DID FOR LOVE (novels), YOU DON’T MEAN THAT (short stories), THE INVENTION OF EYES (poetry), THE MOST BEAUTIFUL MAN IN THE WORLD: PAUL SWAN, FROM WILDE TO WARHOL (biography of artist Paul Swan), and DEAR YEATS, DEAR POUND, DEAR FORD: JEANNE ROBERT FOSTER AND HER CIRCLE OF FRIENDS (biography of poet J.R. Foster). His critical work on Yeats, Joyce, Pound, and Wilder has been internationally acclaimed, and he has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize in Poetry. He is Professor Emeritus of English Literature at the State University of New York at Potsdam.