Adultery and infidelity are some of the hardest things to come to grips with. For the betrayed partner, learning of their lover's unfaithfulness can be akin to grief. But what drives a person to cheat—whether passion, insecurity, desperation, narcissism, or existential crisis—can be equally devastating. This is a list of some of the greatest affairs in literature that explore love, betrayal, selfhood, dependence, independence, loss, time, and memory.
