"Perversion of Love"

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What was once so pure is now a rarity. In today’s society, half of the marriages in the United States are ending in divorce. A person cannot go to the theater without seeing at least one sex scene on the screen, and the shorter or tighter the outfit, the better. The fine line between loving the whole person, inside and out, to just being sexually attracted to them is being crossed more than ever before. This is what the 21st century calls “normal.” However, one has to question if anything has really changed since the writing of The Divine Comedy. By comparing Dante’s Inferno circle about lust and the 2013 hit movie, Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor, there is a clear parallel between the two. In both stories, the major theme is love; however, both show the perversion of that throughout.
Dante Alighieri completed Inferno, a one of three series of The Divine Comedy, in 1314. Inferno lays out Dante’s version of Hell and describes the sinners and their punishments. He separates Hell into nine circles that are arranged in a funnel shape; the greater sins being at the bottom of the funnel. Now, it is no surprise that lust is one of the nine circles of Hell, but it’s of the lesser punishments. On the other hand, Temptation is dealing solely with love and lust. A young couple is broken apart when the wife, who ironically is a marriage counselor, finds a love interest through her job. What seems to be a perfect marriage, with only love for each other, turns into a broken relationship due to lust and deceit.
While Inferno has one main theme, each circle of Hell has its own sin, or theme. The sub-themes range from gluttony, suicide, and betrayal. Ironically, the main theme for Inferno and the sin for circle two coincide. As ...

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...his day. It was obviously a big enough problem to give it a circle in Hell. This sinful act is on the rise, and not going away anytime soon. Unless the society stops applauding this act, future generations may think love and lust mean the same thing. But that leads to the question, if Dante’s Inferno was rewritten from today’s perspective, would lust become one of the greater sins in Hell?

Works Cited

Alighieri, Dante. “Inferno.” The Bedford Anthology of World Literature: The Middle Period, 100 C.E.-1450. Ed. Paul Davis, Gary Harrison, David M. Johnson, Patricia Clark Smith, John F. Crawford. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2004. 678-848. Print.
Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor. Dir. Tyler Perry. Perf. Jurnee Smollett, Lance Gross, Robbie Jones. Lionsgate, 2013. Film
E.L. James. Fifty Shades of Grey. United Kingdom: Vintage Books, 2011. Print.

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