The Decameron is a collection of 100 novellas written by Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375). Scholars say that this collection was completed around 1353. In this book, there are ten men and women who live in Florence, and because of the Black Plague, they decided that it would be better for them to escape the city and head to the suburbs instead. So they flee Florence and station themselves in some villa outside of the city, and spend two weeks pursuing pleasure and good company with each other. For ten days (they skip Friday and Saturday for religious and cultural reasons), they each tell each other a story. There are 100 stories altogether.
Each day has an appointed king or queen, who sets the tone or theme of the day. So one day would be assigned to stories about tricks played by people to one another, for example, as it was the decision of the king or queen for that day. At some point, it was decided that one of them would always be the final story teller for the day, and he had a wildcard so to speak since he always was allowed to tell a story that somehow deviated from the day's theme. Some of the stories would be quite short and compact, while others were longer. In any case, there were plenty of things that this collection of short stories imparted to the modern reader.
For example, somehow religious people such as friars were always portrayed in a negative light: they were always characterised as fat, corrupt, always wanting to smooch things from the laity, and have vices. Monks and nuns have sex all over the place, even though they were supposed to be chaste given their vows. And speaking of sex, people have affairs all over the place. They sleep with each other, they have open marriages, they have plenty of extra-marital relations. The tone of the book actually wasn't judgmental, and rather portrayed these instances as normal aspects of life. Hence I can detect an implicit attitude of rebellion against church doctrine and religious customs.
There are also aspects that sort of was disturbing for the modern reader, like for example how women were portrayed. Women were portrayed as belonging to men, not having their independence. Men could trade wives for example, where one man "gives" another man his fiancee, because the former was a very good friend of the latter. This decision for example was not consulted with the woman in question, but rather done unilaterally. There were other aspects of medieval living, yet I wouldn't expand here. In any case, I definitely have the opinion that I am more than happy to be living in the 21st century and not in the 14th century.
Overall I enjoyed this book, as it has further enriched my knowledge of the past. It was also appropriate that I have read this also during the time of another pandemic: the main characters in the book after all were escaping another pandemic. I give it 4 out of 5 stars.
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