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Volumes 1 and 2 have continuous paging (xiii, 1-423 ; 424-746) Bibliography: leaves 738-746 v. 1. Introduction -- v.2. Notes -- v. 3. Texts -- MS Hunter 15 pt. 2 [microfilm]

Bibliography: p. 17. / "May 1984." / NSF-ECS-8310698

Volumes 1 and 2 have continuous paging (xiii, 1-423 ; 424-746) / Bibliography: leaves 738-746 / 3 v. : ill ; 30 cm. + 1 microfilm (positive ; 35 mm) / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of English Language and Literature, 1993

This thesis has examined the individual accomplishments of Geoffrey Chaucer and Giovanni Boccaccio in terms of their parallel characters and stories. The Chaucerian works used in this study are three stories from The Canterbury Tales: The Knight’s Tale, The Franklin’s Tale, and The Clerk’s Tale. Chaucer’s art of story telling, as exhibited within these stories, has been directly compared to parallel characters and plots taken from the works of Giovanni Boccaccio: The Teseida, The Filocolo, and The Decameron. A direct comparison of Chaucer’s method in creation of character, suspense, and plot to those of Boccaccio has allowed a true estimate of the value of both authors.In addition, it has been possible to examine what Chaucer and Boccaccio found in separate sources but wished to treat differently, what Chaucer saw directly in the works of Boccaccio and wanted to change, and the method of treatment as related to the maturation of the separate writers.

Travestimento/travestitismo: Masquerade and Mischief in Boccaccio’s World examines Boccaccio’s use of masquerade to parody social conventions and invert the cultural themes characterizing fourteenth-century Italy. Its aim is to demonstrate the myriad ways in which the medieval author masks and unmasks characters—often using gender as performance—to gain access to either sublimated sexuality or forbidden power, and ultimately to reveal rather than conceal human nature. This study offers a close reading of the Ninfale fiesolano and five novellas (2.3, 2.9, 3.1, 3.2, and 4.2) of the Decameron, focusing on characters that go beyond their usual identity and/or the limits of their biological sex to occupy transgendered spaces. Today, our understanding of gender studies encompasses a far more inclusive understanding of the term “gender.” This dissertation begins with the concept that gender is fluid and performative, and that though the body may be fixed, its gender is not confined to restrictions imposed on it by society. Some of Boccaccio’s characters, accordingly, occupy multiple gendered spaces while assuming the identity of another sex, in particular Zinevra/Sicurano, the abbot/princess, and Africo (Chapters Two, Three, and Four). Although far from the transformations found in the mythological world of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Boccaccio’s tales offer the “metamorphosis” of the masquerade, that is, a false outward show, a pretense, or façade that oftentimes is achieved through disguise or costume. My analysis considers how masquerade in this way (travestimento) — or in its more radical form of cross-dressing (travestitismo) — paradoxically offers access to the more authentic aims of the protagonists. Although critics have written on deception in the Decameron, they have not dealt thoroughly with the trope of masquerade and have altogether ignored the concept of transvestism. Travestimento/travestitismo: Masquerade and Mischief in Boccaccio’s World advances our understanding of gender and identity in Boccaccio’s work to show that his ideas may help us understand not only the Middle Ages, but also our own epoch.

This study brings together the works of Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) and Gratian’s Decretum, the 12th-century textbook that became foundational to the teaching of medieval canon law. Boccaccio studied canon law for six years, and the Church’s legal system deals with many of the issues that interested Boccaccio: marriage, sexuality, adultery, consent, coercion, and gendered forms of violence. Boccaccio and Gratian each showed close attention to women’s interior perspectives and a marked emphasis on the importance of consent. This dissertation illuminates the intertextual connections between Boccaccio’s works and Gratian’s Decretum, and argues that Boccaccio understand the law much better than has previously been recognized. In fact, Boccaccio’s most perceptive insights on the nature of debt, obligation, and consent derive from legal sources. The first chapter of this project introduces the figures of Boccaccio and Gratian. Boccaccio’s own works and a few surviving documents attest to his years of legal study in Naples as well as his lifelong engagement with the law, both in politics and his personal life. Little is known of Gratian’s biography, but his Decretum became a standard teaching tool in the curriculum of canon law. Boccaccio undoubtedly read the Decretum, and the following chapters show the extent to which its innovative cases and viewpoints influenced him. Chapter 2 begins with the “conjugal debt,” the idea in canon law that spouses incur a mutual sexual obligation by virtue of being married. Boccaccio expands the concept of sexual debt to include metaphorical usury and theft, drawing on medieval economic theory and offering an economic model of human relationships. Though Boccaccio’s view is transactional, it does not reduce human beings to commodities; rather, the economic system expresses relationships of trust and obligation. Chapter 3 extends the legal-economic discourse to several stories in the Decameron that deal with adulterous relationships, demonstrating that Boccaccio’s idiosyncratic application of legal theories is nevertheless solidly grounded in his reading of canon law. Chapter 4 focuses on Boccaccio’s treatment of consent in matters of marriage and legislation. Relying heavily on Gratian’s treatment of error and mistaken identity, as well as the legal principle of quod omnes tangit, Boccaccio argues for women’s right to offer informed consent to decisions that concern them. Chapter 5 continues the discussion of consent in the context of sexual violence, exploring the idea of vis (force) in Gratian’s Decretum as well as Boccaccio’s Decameron and Ninfale fiesolano. Canon law emphasizes women’s right to consent to marriage; Boccaccio extends this principle to matters of sex and violence, recuperating the power of women’s consent in an area where medieval law often faltered.

No description available.

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