I tend to agree completely with what you say in your first paragraph about borrowing and originality. It seems, as far as structure goes, being original meant running the risk of having your work ridiculed as something less than divine art - something that would cause one to lose re$pect, patron$, and lasting fame. Also, borrowing stories for a 101 story book seems perfectly normal.
Structure is where artists probably borrow the most. See, I'm really not qualified to talk about this because I have no idea what these people did back then. I do know that this narrative style was not regarded highly. I know that Italian noblemen kept/hired poets to compose epic tales which included their lineage - comparable to what Virgil did for Caesar - for reasons too obvious to explain. These poets kept, mainly, to a poetic and not a narrative style. You see this all the way down to the 16th century at least.
B. knew the rules to compose poetry that conformed to works already made famous but he had much more talent for the style and content we see here in the D. His narrative style that he mocks in the first pages of his work was probably done because of popular opinion of art back then. Was his work original in that its style was narrative rather than conforming to some poetic rule? No... people have been telling stories around camp fires for what I assume to be for as long as we had the ability to talk and had fire. B.'s originality is seen, in my opinion, by the complete package of the book. It has borrowed elements which include the framing, the narrative style, content, ideals, popular opinion, superstition, probably the stories themselves, influences from various artists .... but he is the one who mixes these colors and applies them to his canvas. His work is unique in that aspect. I've never read another Decameron type book from this period. He has to add a lot of himself into these stories as well. The satire is too thick for him not to.
I don't think the names, dates, places are used to particularize the tale so much as lend them believability. He could have used any name to set them apart from one another or tie them into each other. Instead, he uses names which people know and then weaves a plausible story around them. People believe what they read and because they can say, "I've hear about him!" - well then it must be true.
Courtly love - I totally forgot about this until you brought it up and I'm really glad that you did. Courtly love makes everything ok and that's something that we, today, have chosen to regard as a wicked philosophy. This meant that adulterous love was more than acceptable. The translator of the book said it received an exalted status - it was something romantic, chivalrous, and true. It was a heavenly ideal to love so strongly that you did anything to be with your lady love no matter if she really wanted to be with you, you tricked her into bed, or she had a husband.
You're also right about the ladies. There aren't too many comely wenches in these tales - just super models. The more you read the more you'll see nobles falling for common men and women. Love is too powerful a force for the old feudal ways!!! ...noble men and women alike are powerless when they see a commoner they want to have a go with.
... ... ... ... ... ...
I'd retype the whole convo between the men and the women but it's a bit too long - page 280.
On telling the 7 ladies that the men would have showed them how well they could make love to them...
Neifile (the youngest of the 7 ladies) : "if you men had tried to teach us anything of the sort, you might have learned some sense from us, as Masetto did from the nuns, and retrieved the use of your tongues when your bones were rattling of exhaustion."
WOWOW!!!! I'd make her prove it!
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