Giovanni Boccaccio - The Decameron (Penguin Classics)

Giovanni Boccaccio - The Decameron (Penguin Classics, 1995). Second edition, translated with an Introduction and Notes by G. H. McWilliam.

ISBN: 978-0140449303 | 1072 pages | ePUB


THE DECAMERON is a collection of novellas by the 14th-century Italian author GIOVANNI BOCCACCIO (1313-1375) that has remained immensely popular from its original appearance to the present.

Like the Divine Comedy, the Decameron is a towering monument of medieval pre-Renaissance literature, but whereas Dante is a stern moralist, Boccaccio has little time for chastity, pokes fun at crafty, hypocritical clerics and celebrates the power of passion to overcome obstacles and social divisions. The book is structured as a frame story containing 100 tales of love and adventure told by ten charming young Florentines sheltering in a secluded villa just outside Florence to escape the Black Death. The various tales range from the erotic to the tragic; tales of wit, practical jokes, and life lessons contribute to the mosaic.

In a new introduction to this revised edition, which also includes additional explanatory notes, maps, bibliography and indexes, Professor McWilliam shows us Boccaccio for what he is -- one of the world's greatest masters of vivid and exciting prose fiction.