Description
Book SynopsisDivided into ten days of ten novellas each, Boccaccio’s Decameron is one of the literary gems of the fourteenth century. The Decameron Eighth Day in Perspective is an interpretive guide to the stories of the text’s Day Eight a day dedicated to tales of tricks and practical jokes. By drawing on literary precursors such as fabliaux, epic, philosophy, exempla, Dante’s Commedia, and scripture, and by meditating on the dynamics of civic engagement in fourteenth-century Florence, Boccaccio develops in these stories of jests a self-consciously literary representation of the Florentine social imaginary.
The essays in this volume, all written by prominent scholars, survey previous scholarship and open up new cultural and historical perspectives on Boccaccio’s sophisticated art of storytelling. They analyze both the literary sources that Boccaccio’s comic narratives transform, as well as the political, legal, and ethical c
Trade Review
"For each novella, the reader will find both a good summary of the precedent critical literature and new and innovative interpretations of the role of the beffa within Decameron’s eighth day and in the context of the two precedent days of narration." -- Nicola Esposito, PhD Candidate, University of Notre Dame * Annali d’italianistica *
Table of Contents
Introduction William Robins 1. The Tale of Gulfardo and Ambruogia (Decameron VIII.1) K.P. Clarke 2. Obscene Exchanges (Decameron VIII.2) Maggie Fritz-Morkin 3. The Artist and the Police: Calandrino’s Invisibility and the Legal Fictions of Decameron VIII.3 Justin Steinberg 4. Monna Piccarda, Ciutazza, and the Provost of Fiesole: An Absence of Beauty (Decameron VIII.4) Katherine A. Brown 5. The Jokesters and the Judge (Decameron VIII.5) William Robins and Leah Faibisoff 6. The Tale of Calandrino and the Stolen Pig (Decameron VIII.6) Rhiannon Daniels 7. The Scholar and the Widow: Corrupt Appetite and Moral Failure in Society’s Intellectual Elite (Decameron VIII.7) Teodolinda Barolini 8. Doing Unto Others, or Sienese Polyamory (Decameron VIII.8) Olivia Holmes 9. The Three Faults of Master Simone (Decameron VIII.9) Elisa Brilli 10. The Tale of Salabaetto and Iancofiore (Decameron VIII.10) Roberta Morosini Bibliography
