The book "The Decameron" by Giovanni Boccaccio is one of the most striking and famous works of the Early Renaissance in Italy. What this book is about and what it deserves the love of readers from, you can learn from this article.
To the question of the name
“Decameron” literally translates from ancient Greek as “ten days”. Here, the author follows the tradition of Greek texts, which came from Ambrose of Mediolansky, devoted to the theme of creating a world in six days - “Six Day”. As in similar texts, in Decameron the name directly refers to the plot. However, unlike medieval treatises, the world is not created by God, but by man, and not in six, but in ten days.
In addition to the official title, the book was subtitled “Prince Galeotto” (in Italian “Galeotto” means “pivot”). It hinted at the opponents of Boccaccio, who argued that the writer undermines the moral principles of society with his short stories.
History of creation
It is believed that the "Decameron" Boccaccio was written in 1348-1351 in Naples and Florence. A kind of occasion and source of inspiration for the writer was the plague of 1349 - a very real historical fact used by him in the work.
The originally published book became popular not among the intended target audience - the Italian intelligentsia, but among merchants reading the Decameron as a collection of erotic stories. But closer to the 15th century, the work became popular among other segments of the population of Italy, and after that - throughout Europe, bringing Boccaccio world fame. Since the invention of printing, the Decameron has become one of the most published books.
The Decameron was included in the 1559 Prohibited Books Index as an anti-clerical work. The church immediately condemned the work and its author for many immoral details, which gave rise to doubts about Boccaccio whether the Decameron has a right to exist. He even planned to burn the original, from which Petrarch dissuaded him. However, until the end of days, the writer was shy of his brainchild, repenting of its creation.
Genre of the Decameron
According to the researchers, Boccaccio perfected the novel's genre in the book “The Decameron”, giving it features that are so attractive to the reader - bright, juicy Italian folk, interesting images, entertaining stories (which were well-known, but sometimes interpreted quite unusual). The author’s center of attention was a typically renaissance issue - personality self-awareness, which is why Decameron is often called the “Human Comedy”, by analogy with the famous work of Dante.
Thanks to Boccaccio's new approach , the novella novella became fundamental to the literature of the Italian Renaissance - it had never reached such a peak before, although it had existed for a long time.
Summary of the Decameron Boccaccio
Boccaccio's text is curious in structure. It is a “frame” composition with numerous short stories inserted into it. Most of them are devoted to a love theme that ranges from light eroticism to real tragedies.
The main action takes place in 1348 in Florence, plagued by a plague. In one of the city cathedrals there are young noble people - seven girls and three young men. Together they decide to retire from the city to a remote villa in order to wait out the epidemic there. Thus, the action resembles a feast during the plague.
The characters are described as real people, but their names directly correspond to their characters.
Being outside the city, they entertain each other, telling all kinds of stories - these are not the original texts of Giovanni Boccaccio, but various diverse fairy-tale, folklore and religious motifs processed by him. They are taken from all layers of cultures - these are oriental tales, and the writings of Apuleius, and Italian anecdotes, and French fablio, and moral sermons of priests.
The action takes place over ten days, each of which contains ten short stories. The story itself is preceded by a description of the pastime of young people - sophisticated and intelligent. In the morning, the queen or king of the day is elected, defining the theme of today's stories, and in the evening one of the ladies performs a ballad, summing up the stories. On weekends, young people take a break, so they stay in the villa for two weeks, after which they return to Florence.