Italian Poetry - Literary Criticism, General & Miscellaneous Italian Fiction & Prose Literature - Literary Criticism, Rhetoric
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Overview
The Decameron is a narrative account of a situation in which narration takes place - a collection of one hundred stories set within a larger story. As a group of young men and women fleeing the plague trade stories to pass the time of crisis, storytelling occurs in a social context that allows for comment upon the tales by the tellers themselves, in a setting that elicits one story in return for another. In his close and original analysis, Pier Massimo Forni uses the notion of rhetoric as a guiding principle for a critical assessment of the Decameron. He explores the discursive tools with which the narrators connect the contents of their stories to their audience's environment, and goes on to argue that the book is significantly marked by Boccaccio's habit of exploring the narrative potential of rhetorical forms. Puzzling narrative segments and stories make new sense once they are understood to dramatize or enact metaphors and other figures of speech.Editorials
Booknews
The Decameron's stories within a story is an irresistible rhetorical device ripe for critical study as an ever widening wave of narrative context where author and authors weave among the stories and even comment on their own work. Massimo (Italian studies, Johns Hopkins U.) explores these discursive tools with an incisive attention, combining structural theory with cultural and rhetorical examinations while never devaluing the sheer poetry of the work. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)Book Details
Published
March 26, 1996
Publisher
Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, c1996.
Pages
176
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780812233384