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The Use Of Infidelity In Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

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One of the more comforting characteristics of human history is its overall lack of originality. People, regardless of location or situation, tend to act exactly as their predecessors did. It is with this nugget of knowledge that the current generation can look to the future with a certain sense of ease, knowing that it will probably be no different from the past they have read about in history books. This occurrence, the repetition of human nature throughout time, is no more evident than in a comparison of Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales and contemporary society. While Chaucer primarily used his writing to satirize the people of his day, he simultaneously and unwittingly satirized those of the future who share the same unfortunate circumstances. In Chaucer’s “The Miller’s Tale”, he uses infidelity and the relationship between husband and wife to ridicule marriage. In popular …show more content…

Even the Playboy himself, Hugh Hefner, experienced a similar situation of adultery. In 1949, Hugh Hefner married Mildred Williams, a student he met at Northwestern. Before their nuptials, Mildred revealed that while Hefner was serving in the Armed Forces during World War II, she had cheated on him ("Hugh Hefner: Girlfriends, Wives and Centerfolds”). Though they decided to marry anyway, Hefner stated that it was “the most devastating moment of [his] life” (Sparks) In his E! True Hollywood story, Hefner disclosed that his wife let him sleep with other women during the duration marriage due to the guilt that she had. They divorced in 1959. The years following their divorce show Hefner with a tremendous amount of success with his magazine, Playboy. Hefner became an icon to men everywhere due to the content of the magazine and the trials and tribulations Hefner had with his many girlfriends were public knowledge due to tabloids and later, a reality show ("Hugh Hefner Biography - Facts, Birthday, Life Story -

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