Response Paper: Decameron, Fifth to Tenth Days,
and Marguerite de Navarre
Choose one of the following areas as the focus of your response paper:
How do the stories of the Fifth Day of the Decameron differ from
the stories of the Fourth Day? Why do some stories end happily and
others not? What roles do men and women play in the stories with happy
endings? What roles do men and women play in the stories with unhappy
endings? What do the stories tell us about Boccaccio's view of male
and female gender roles? What do they tell us about how Boccaccio's
world works?
What do the stories of Brother Onion, Peronella, Tingoccio and Meuccio,
Calandrino, and the abbess with pants on her head tell us about the way
Boccaccio's world works? Some people have argued that the story of
Compare Pietro reveals Boccaccio's true thinking about the world and human
nature. What does Boccaccio seem to think of human nature?
What do you make of the last story in the Decameron? What do
you think of Griselda and Gualtieri? Why is their story appropriate as
a way to sum up or conclude the whole Decameron? Why would
Boccaccio end the Decameron with this story?
Why does Boccaccio begin and end the Decameron by calling it "Decameron,
also known as Prince Galeotto"? Look at the footnote about
Galeotto on p. 1. What does the Decameron have to do with
Dante's portrayal of Francesca in the Inferno? Why would
Boccaccio call his book Prince Galeotto? How is it like the
romance that Francesca and Paolo were reading when they succumbed to their
lust? How is it like the character in the King Arthur stories?
How are Marguerite de Navarre's stories different from Boccaccio's?
How does Marguerite portray women? What does she have to say about
gender roles? Choose one story from Marguerite and one story from
Boccaccio to compare and contrast.