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A review by uncle_remus
The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio
1.0
Grimm's Fairy Tales X Penthouse Letters, written in medieval euphemisms (mortar's and pestles, catching the nightingale, etc); well, that's what I thought when reading these. The tales were short and simplistic, sometimes with a moral (like Grimm's), but the content was not supernatural (witches, ogres, etc), but stories of cuckolds and cheating men and women for the first 9 days. Most stories are very misogynistic (which is likely a facet of the times, rather than the intent of the author), and the people are stupid, mean and base towards their spouses and so-called friends and neighbors. One story even encouraged men to use a stick to beat their wives to nearly death to keep themselves happy (Tale 9 on Ninth Day). Tale 8 on Eighth Day was wife swapping and wife sharing. Tale 4 on Day 10 hints at necrophilia. I guess its not surprising topics, but to say these are moralistic tales, or good writing, or a 'classic', well,... it is not.
Although I understand this is a classic, I could not understand why. It is not great literary prose. They are brief tales, with little to say in terms of plot or character development. Sometimes with a moral, sometimes not. It was supposed to be entertaining, but I disliked so many of the characters and what they were doing, I found it fell flat.
I did like the conclusion, whereby the scribe acknowledges his self-awareness of the stories and says many of the same things. But 3-4 pages of interesting writing of a 500+ page tome does not merit more than 1 star.
Although I understand this is a classic, I could not understand why. It is not great literary prose. They are brief tales, with little to say in terms of plot or character development. Sometimes with a moral, sometimes not. It was supposed to be entertaining, but I disliked so many of the characters and what they were doing, I found it fell flat.
I did like the conclusion, whereby the scribe acknowledges his self-awareness of the stories and says many of the same things. But 3-4 pages of interesting writing of a 500+ page tome does not merit more than 1 star.