The Decameron: The Original English Translation by John Florio (Annotated)
Enriched Edition. Plague-Era Florence, Renaissance Wit, and One Hundred Tales of Love, Satire, and FortuneBy Giovanni Boccaccio
Length38h 22m
About this audiobook
Set against the devastation of the 1348 Florentine plague, The Decameron gathers one hundred tales told over ten days by ten young refugees who withdraw to a country villa. Its architecture is at once elegant and audacious: a framed sequence of novelle moving between bawdy comedy, tragic love, clerical satire, mercantile cunning, and moral ambiguity. In John Florio's vigorous early modern English, Boccaccio's supple Italian prose acquires a richly idiomatic, Renaissance texture, preserving the work's wit, narrative momentum, and worldly intelligence. Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375), formed by the commercial culture of Naples and the humanist ferment of Florence, wrote with unusual sensitivity to social variety: merchants, monks, women, servants, nobles, and tricksters all speak with memorable vitality. His experience of urban life, classical learning, vernacular experimentation, and the catastrophe of plague helped shape a book that confronts mortality not with abstraction, but with storytelling, laughter, desire, and practical wisdom. This edition is recommended for readers interested in the foundations of European prose fiction, Renaissance translation, and the complex origins of modern narrative realism. It rewards both scholarly attention and simple delight, offering a humane, ironic, and inexhaustibly inventive portrait of society under pressure.
This enriched edition has been carefully crafted to add value to your reading experience.
- A comprehensive Introduction outlines these selected works' unifying features, themes, or stylistic evolutions.
- The Author Biography highlights personal milestones and literary influences that shape the entire body of writing.
- A Historical Context section situates the works in their broader era—social currents, cultural trends, and key events that underpin their creation.
- A concise Synopsis (Selection) offers an accessible overview of the included texts, helping readers navigate plotlines and main ideas without revealing critical twists.
- A unified Analysis examines recurring motifs and stylistic hallmarks across the collection, tying the stories together while spotlighting the different work's strengths.
- Reflection questions inspire deeper contemplation of the author's overarching message, inviting readers to draw connections among different texts and relate them to modern contexts.
- Lastly, our hand‐picked Memorable Quotes distill pivotal lines and turning points, serving as touchstones for the collection's central themes.
Audiobook details
GenreLiterary Classics, General Fiction
Length38 hrs 22 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateJul 10, 2013
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1The Decameron: The Original English Translation by John Florio (Annotated)
2Introduction
3Author Biography
4Historical Context
5Synopsis (Selection)
Show all chaptersShow less
6The Induction of the Author to the Following Discourses
7The First Day
8The First Day, the First Novell
9The First Day, the Second Novell
10The First Day, the Third Novell
11The First Day, the Fourth Novell
12The First Day, the Fift Novell
13The First Day, the Sixt Novell
14The First Day, the Seventh Novell
15The First Day, the Eight Novell
16The First Day, the Ninth Novell
17The First Day, the Tenth Novell
18The Second Day
19The Induction to the Second Day
20The Second Day, the First Novell
21The Second Day, the Second Novell
22The Second Day, the Third Novell
23The Second Day, the Fourth Novell
24The Second Day, the Fift Novell
25The Second Day, the Sixt Novell
26The Second Day, the Seventh Novell
27The Second Day, the Eight Novell
28The Second Day, the Ninth Novell
29The Second Day, the Tenth Novell
30The Third Day
31The Induction to the Third Day
32The Third Day, the First Novell
33The Third Day, the Second Novell
34The Third Day, the Third Novell
35The Third Day, the Fourth Novell
36The Third Day the Fifth Novell
37The Third Day the Sixth Novell
38The Third Day, the Seaventh Novell
39The Third Day, the Eight Novell
40The Third Day, the Ninth Novell
41The Third Day, the Tenth Novell
42The Fourth Day
43The Induction to the Fourth Day
44The Fourth Day, the First Novell
45The Fourth Day, the Second Novell
46The Fourth Day, the Third Novell
47The Fourth Day, the Fourth Novell
48The Fourth Day, the Fift Novell
49The Fourth Day, the Sixth Novell
50The Fourth Day, the Seventh Novell
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