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Title: The Decameron (Oxford World's Classics) by Giovanni Boccaccio, Guido Waldman, Jonathan Usher ISBN: 0-19-283691-9 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: January, 1999 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.79 (29 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: (4.5) A fun and humorous look at 14th century social life.
Comment: 'The Decameron' is a fascinating example of classic literature that remains fresh and entertaining today. Written in the mid-14th century, it concerns the first major outbreak of the black plague in Europe, which first emerged in Italy in approximately 1347. Boccaccio begins, in the prologue, by stating his purpose for writing the book - namely, to entertain literate women with nothing else to do with their time. The story itself concerns ten young Florentines (seven women - Pampinea, Filomena, Neifile, Fiammetta, Elissa, Lauretta, and Emilia; and three men - Panfilo, Dioneo, and Filostrato) who flee the city in hopes of escaping the plague. To occupy themselves during this time, they tell each other stories, with each person telling one story per day to make a total of 100 stories over the course of the entire book. At the beginning of the first day, Boccaccio provides an excellent and detailed description of the plague itself. The book ends with the refugees returning to their homes, and a closing epilogue from the author.
I very much enjoyed 'The Decameron.' It is interesting and easy to read. The characters in the various stories are ordinary people and this makes them seem very real. Many of them actually are based on real people. Some of the stories, too, are inspired by actual events, though not all. This particular edition is an excellent translation. It is very user-friendly while still retaining the 14th century 'feel' of it. I also liked the organization of the book, as it was always very easy to find a 'stopping place.' With some novels, it's hard to set them down, but since The Decameron is a collection of short stories, one can always stop at the end of any particular story and come back later.
Boccaccio claims that his goal in writing 'The Decameron' was to entertain and 'provide succour and diversion' (Prologue 3) to young women who are in love - presumably those whose love lives are not going well at the moment. He says he wishes to 'offer some solace' (Prologue 2) to these women, and also 'some useful advice' (Prologue 3). While this sounds like a noble aim on first glance, I have to wonder about his sincerity. A good many of the stories involve characters who go to rather immoral ends to achieve their aims, and I find it odd that such examples would be given in a book intended to instruct a young lady.
Nevertheless, the book is great fun to read. The stories are lively and colorful, and often quite humorous. It provides an excellent insight into the everyday lives of people during this time period. I will caution, however, that most of the stories involve sexuality in some way, and many revolved around it completely. If you are easily offended by bawdy humor, this may not be the book for you. Nearly all the characters of the various tales are sexually active, most with more than one partner. There are also homosexual and bisexual characters. Sexual infidelity is treated here as not only acceptable, but widely encouraged. Characters who cheat on their spouses regularly come out on top, while those that are cuckolded are laughed at and made to look like fools. The unfaithful partner is rewarded and the faithful one shamed and called a prude.
The one thing I do wish Boccaccio had talked more about is the ten people who were actually telling the stories. There are hints of Filostrato having a romantic interest in fellow-storyteller Filomena, but this is never followed up on, except to hint that Filomena is herself interested in someone else not of the company. I would like to know if anything more ever came of Filostrato's interest. I would also have liked to know more of what happened to the ten storytellers upon returning to Florence at the end of the book. Had the plague passed? What had happened to those they left behind? Did any of the ten themselves catch the plague? All of this is left out and I found the ending to be somewhat abrupt.
Perhaps most unclear to me, however, is how the ten were even able to flee the plague as they did. There is no talk of preparation, and it seems that they just dropped everything and left. The places they stayed were abandoned estates that they simply happened upon. Boccaccio says of the second place they stayed, 'she brought them [. . .] to a most beautiful and ornate palace. [. . .] They explored it from end to end and were filled with admiration for its spacious halls and well-kept, elegant rooms, which were equipped with everything they could possibly need, and they came to the conclusion that only a gentleman of the highest rank could have owned it' (Introduction, Third Day, 189). Why were places such as this abandoned? Had its owner/s died of plague? Or if the owners were not dead but had instead fled from the plague, why did they not take some of their things with them? Why was everything left in these places as if nothing was amiss? It all seems a bit unreal to me.
Overall the book is written very well for what it is - a collection of short stories. It is, however, lacking in character development. Most of the storytellers were very flat emotionally, and it would have been nice to see them fleshed out a little more. But in the context of a short story or group of short stories this lack of depth is more forgivable than it would be in a novel. With the exception of Dioneo, who seems to be the most creative and fun-loving of the ten, and Filostrato, who seems absorbed in moping and self-pity for much of the book (presumably over his unrequited interest in Filomena), I found it hard to distinguish one storyteller from another. But the focal point of the book is the stories themselves, and these are all highly entertaining. Though the frequent sexual references may make the book inappropriate for younger audiences, I would highly recommend it for any mature reader.
Rating: 5
Summary: A True Classic
Comment: Any book defined as a true classic is likely to be thought of as stultifying and incomprehensible...at best. Yet, there are dozens and dozens of books that are true classics and still manage to speak to today's modern audience. Boccaccio's Decameron is one such book.
The Decameron was written around 1350 during an outbreak of plague in Florence. It is the fictional account of ten young people who flee the city to a country manor house and, in an effort to keep themselves occupied and diverted, begin telling stories.
Ten days pass in the pages of the Decameron (hence its name), and each person tells one story per day, making a total of one hundred stories. These are stories that explore a surprisingly wide range of moral, social and political issues whose wit and candor will probably surprise most modern readers. The topics explored include: problems of corruption in high political office, sexual jealousy and the class differences between the rich and the poor.
The titles themselves are both imaginative and fun. One story is titled, "Masetto da Lamporecchio Pretends to be Deaf and Dumb in Order to Become a Gardener to a Convent of Nuns, Where All the Women Eagerly Lie With Him." And, although the title, itself, is a pretty good summary of the story, even a title such as this cannot adequately convey Boccaccio's humor and wit.
Another story that seems surprisingly modern is, "Two Men are Close Friends, and One Lies With the Other's Wife. The Husband Finds it Out and Makes the Wife Shut Her Lover in a Chest, and While He is Inside, the Husband Lies With the Lover's Own Wife on the Chest." A bit long for today's modern world, perhaps, where popular books are dominated by titles such as John Grisham's The Firm, but the outcome of this story is as socially-relevant today as anything that happened in fourteenth-century Florence.
The Decameron, however, goes far beyond plain, bawdy fun and takes a close look at a society that is unraveling due to the devastating effects of the plague. The people in Boccaccio's time suffered terribly and the book's opening pages show this. The clergy was, at best, inept and, more often than not, corrupt. Those who had the misfortune to fall ill (and this includes just about everyone) were summarily abandoned by both their friends and family.
Those looking for something representative of the social ills of Boccaccio's day will find more than enough interesting tidbits and asides in these stories. Serious students of literature will find the ancestors of several great works of fiction in these pages and readers in general cannot fail to be entertained by the one hundred stories spun by these ten refugees on their ten lonely nights.
Rating: 5
Summary: Forget everything you learned in catechism...
Comment: ...that is if you don't want to go to bed feeling extremely guilty every night. I had to read this over 6 weeks while studying in Tuscany. It is quite humorous and interesting, however it goes against everything that I learned in Catholic school. Ironically most of the dirty deeds being done are by those who've been chosen to "spread the good word."
It is fabulous however when reading it one must forget their background and dive in over the top to be able to move through the book.
Are the stories in the Decameron true? I hear the sequel is being relived right now all over the country.
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