Elegia di Madonna Fiammetta, or The Elegy of Lady Fiammetta in English, is a novel by the Italian writer Giovanni Boccaccio, probably written between 1343 and 1344. Written in the form of a first-person confessional monologue, it describes the protagonist, Fiammetta's, passion for Panfilo, a Florentine merchant, and takes place in Naples. It has been characterised as the first psychological novel in Western literature. It consists of a prologue and nine chapters.
Lady Fiammetta recounts her tragic love affair with Panfilo, offering it as a warning to other women. Lady Fiammetta and Panfilo quickly fall in love and have an affair, only to have it end when Panfilo returns to Florence.
Although he promises to return to Naples, she eventually realizes that he has another lover in Florence. The narrative revolves around Fiammetta's jealousy and despair caused by the affair, rather than the development of her relationship with Panfilo. She eventually considers suicide, but her nurse stops her. Her hopes in the end are bolstered by the news that Panfilo may be coming back to Naples after all.
Two translations of Boccaccio's Elegia have come out in recent years. The two translations differ in their principles of translation and their Italian texts. The Elegy of Madonna Fiammetta Sent by Her to Women in Love, by Roberta L. Payne and Alexandra Hennessey Olsenhope, is aimed at a popular audience. The Mariangela Causa-Steindler and Thomas Mauch translation, The Elegy of Lady Fiammetta, is more scholarly.
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Giovanni Boccaccio was an Italian writer, poet, correspondent of Petrarch, and an important Renaissance humanist. Born in the town of Certaldo, he became so well known as a writer that he was sometimes simply known as "the Certaldese" and one of the most important figures in the European literary panorama of the fourteenth century. Some scholars define him as the greatest European prose writer of his time, a versatile writer who amalgamated different literary trends and genres, making them converge in original works, thanks to a creative activity exercised under the banner of experimentalism.
Lucrezia Borgia was an Italian noblewoman of the House of Borgia who was the daughter of Pope Alexander VI and Vannozza dei Cattanei. She reigned as the Governor of Spoleto, a position usually held by cardinals, in her own right.
This article contains summaries and commentaries of the 100 stories within Giovanni Boccaccio's The Decameron.
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Iaia of Cyzicus, sometimes (incorrectly) called Lala or Lalla, or rendered as Laia or Maia, was a Greek painter born in Cyzicus, Roman Empire, and relatively exceptional for being a woman artist and painting women's portraits. She was alive during the time of Marcus Terentius Varro. In De Mulieribus Claris, his book of women's biographies, Boccaccio refers to her as "Marcia", possibly confusing her with the Vestal Virgin of that name. According to Pliny the Elder: "No one had a quicker hand than she in painting".
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Andrea Acciaioli or Acciaiuoli was an Italian noblewoman, as the Countess of Altavilla in the 14th century. Born in Florence, she was known through her brother to Giovanni Boccaccio, and was the person to whom he dedicated his book On Famous Women.
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The Decameron, subtitled Prince Galehaut and sometimes nicknamed l'Umana commedia, is a collection of short stories by the 14th-century Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375). The book is structured as a frame story containing 100 tales told by a group of seven young women and three young men; they shelter in a secluded villa just outside Florence in order to escape the Black Death, which was afflicting the city. Boccaccio probably conceived of the Decameron after the epidemic of 1348, and completed it by 1353. The various tales of love in The Decameron range from the erotic to the tragic. Tales of wit, practical jokes, and life lessons contribute to the mosaic. In addition to its literary value and widespread influence, it provides a document of life at the time. Written in the vernacular of the Florentine language, it is considered a masterpiece of classical early Italian prose.
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