Reading Boccaccio’s the Decameron with Joseph Luzzi

“It is human to have compassion for the suffering.” So begins Giovanni Boccaccio’s extraordinary classic, the Decameron, a collection of one hundred short stories written in 1353, just five years after the Great Plague of 1348 that claimed millions of lives throughout Europe and more than half of the population of Boccaccio’s hometown, Florence.

Boccaccio’s work has long been celebrated for its bawdy humor and open exploration of sexuality in stories that include a hardened criminal on his death bed tricking a gullible priest, an arrogant horse dealer who falls into a sewer after being duped by a prostitute pretending to be his sister, and a group of enterprising nuns who discreetly employ a gardener to satisfy their carnal urges. Less known are the profound undercurrents swirling beneath Boccaccio’s entertaining narratives, as he explores such key issues as how to rebuild a world devastated by pandemic, the role of women as readers in Europe’s new literary culture, and the creation of the “Renaissance” itself through the reanimation of long-lost pagan and classical traditions.

Our first set of sessions will focus on a selection of Boccaccio’s stories from the Decameron: Days 1 – 5; our second will cover Days 6 – 10. We will develop a fuller understanding of why his work is often seen as Italy’s version of the “Human Comedy,” especially in relation to the author and book that deeply influenced it, Dante and his Divine Comedy. Recommended text: Boccaccio, The Decameron, trans. W. Rebhorn (Norton, 2013).

First set of sessions meet Mondays: April 25, May 2, 9, 16. Second set of sessions meet Mondays: May 30, June 6, 13 and 20. Each session will be recorded and made available for a week to registered students.