OBSERVATIONS ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE DECAMERON NOVELLA
BY MARGA COTTI NO J0NE' S
GENRE theory and definitions seem to be undergoing a lively revival at the present,especially by the new "récit" criticism, after a long periodof banishment from the critical scene. Capitalizing on this resumption of critical concern for the genres, the present inquiry into the narrative form used by Boccaccio in his Decameron is an attempt to postulate a basic definition of his novella, which may be at the same time flexible enough to be applied through a simple process of amplification or reduction to other similar narrative forms. This brief perusal into the problem of the decameronian novella seems particularly desirable because of the incredibly limited amount of scholarly investigation dedicated to the subject.1
We will begin then by placing the decameronian tale in its historical context and compare it to the tales of earlier or contemporary collections of the '200 or '300. If we take, for instance, as comparable parallels, the parables of the Fiore di Virtù, or the short novelline of the Conti di antichi cavalieri, or the delightful anecdotes of the Novellino, or still the interjected novelle-exempla of the Specchio di vera penitenza by Jacopo Passavanti, we must recognize a substantial difference separating them in the matter of their narrative structure from the decameronian novella.
The earlier form of tale can be described as a reduced and compact structure developing only in one direction out of a close-knit narrative nucieus, created by brief and condensed syntactical constructions and firnited lexical choice and centered around a minimal set of main characters. To exemplify this definition and demonstrate the difference in narrative structure between these earlier tales and the decameronian ones, let us consider a specific tale from the Novellino
2 in a comparative correlation with the the third novella of the Prima Giornata of the Decameron which is inspired directly by the former. The result of this critical discussion will provide the basis for our eventual definition of a Boccaccio novella.In the LXXIII tale of the Novellino, the story of "Corne il Soldano, avendo bisogno di moneta, volle coglier cagione a un giudeo"
3 concisio is the guiding narrative principle; there is no exordium and the tale opens in medias res without any preparatory statement or descriptive presentation of the main characters. The syntax is very simple, mainly made up of short sentences paratactically coordinated or articulated in simplified hypotactical form, as visible in the following: "Il Soldano mandò per questo giudeo e domandolli..."; "egli fu un padre ch'avea tre figlioli e avea un suo anello. . ."; "fammi due anella così ... e metti in ciascuno una pietra che somigli questa . . ." (p. 143). There is repetition of the same words, such as giudeo, anello, pietra, etc., or of the same expressions, such as "s'egli dirà la giudea, io dirò ... E se dirà la saracina, e io dirò.. ."; "fammi due anella, così appunto.. . Lo maestro fece l'anella così appunto . . ."; "cogliesse cagione ... coglierli cagione. . ."; etc. This lexical limitation is further stressed by the presence of the same words - for instance, fine - used more than once with different meaning each time, suggesting thereby an ambiguity where in reality there is none: "alla sua fine," meaning 'end, death'; "mandò per un fine orafo," meaning 'refined, excellent', and used in an adjectival forin; "nessuno conoscea il fine," meaning here, in a pronominal form, 'the real one', and in the same connotative way is repeated later on: "e catuno si credea aver il fine."The central action-counteraction unit is given by the "parable inside the tale" narrated by the jew and through which the "1esson" of the story is provided in a final comparison whereby the father of the parable becomes the Heavenly Father, the three sons mankind subdivided in religious sects, and the rings the three faiths. The brevity and concision of the story are thus heightened by the simplicity of the symax, the economy, even monotony, of the lexicon, and the extreme abruptness of narrative transitions. This is visible, for instance, in the transition between Saladin's question and the jew's answer, where the parable is introduced ali of a sudden without a minimum of preparation: "Il giudeo, udendo la domanda del signore, rispose cos": 'Messere, elli fu un padre, ch'avea tre figliuoli, ed avea un suo anello …' (p. 143). The same happens at the end of the parable, when Saladin's reaction comes on equally abruptly: "Allora il Soldano, udendo costui così riscuotersi, non seppe che si dire di coglierli cagione: sì lo lascio andare" (p. 144).
At the same time, it has to be recognized that the "parable inside the tale" is a compositional device of some narrative sophistication, since it transposes the events of the tale on a paradiginatic level reproducing them in an animated personified interaction between five characters: the father, his three sons, and the goldsmith. The animation goes indeed as far as to personalize the latter character by having the father use a direct speech to address him: " 'Maestro, famini due anella, così appunto come questo, e metti in ciascuno una pietra che somigli questa' " (p. 143). On the other hand, the importance granted to such a secondary character in the tense economy of the story, seems excessive and breaks the flow of the narrative.
The end of the story implies the closing up of the situation on the same semantic level as the beginning without any change having occurred either physically to the giudeo or intellectually io Saladin. No mutation, then, has occurred for cither of the two characters as a result of their encounter. This Novellino tale, therefore, is a relatively simple narrative prototype conveyed by an uncomplicated symactical structure, a repetitive rhythm, and a limited lexicon, which can account also for the frail delineation and lack of plastic projection in the main characters.
The Decameron novella 1, 3, instead, which is a free adaptatio, this tale, presents a more varied organization and a more intricate balance than the Novellino story. We are faced at once with an ampie two-part exordium: the first part provides a narrative connection with the previous tale so that a clear underlying continuity is kept among all novelle of the same day: 'La novella da Neifile detta mi ritorna a memoria il dubbioso caso già avvenuto ad un giudeo ..."
4 The second part, instead, introduces directly the main theme and the moral of the novella: "sì come la sciocchezza spesse volte trae altrui di felice stato e mette in grandissima miseria, così il senno di grandissimi pericoli trae il savio e potilo in grande e in sicuro riposo" (pp. 7475). Moreover, the exordium introduces at once the basic opposition of the novella, through the antithetical pair sciocchezza-senno and grandissima miseria-fortuna, which prepare for the main conflict between Saladin's miseria and Melchisedec's fortuna, from which springs the test whereby Melchisedec's senno will eventually be proven.The main characters are briefly but appropriately described in the specific characteristics which will have a bearing in the development of the action: "Il Saladino, il valore del qual fu tanto che non solamente di piccolo uomo il fé di Babilonia Soldano, ma ancora molte vittorie sopra li re saracini e cristiani gli fece avere, avendo in diverse guerre e in grandissime sue magnificenze speso tutto il suo tesoro ... gli venne a memoria un ricco giudeo ... e pensossi costui avere da poterlo servire ... e ... s'avvisò di fargli una forza da alcuna ragion colorata" (pp. 75-76). The specific quality of sovereign and nearly tyrannic power is underlined in this description, together with that of magnificence and sharpiless of inind; while for Melchisedec "un ricco giudeo ... il quale veramente era savio uomo" (pp. 75-76), his main qualitics are wealth and wisdom, iogether with sharpness of mind ("aguzzato l'ingegno") which allows for a potential similarity with Saladin.
All the essential narrative transitions are here carefully prepared and intentionally constructed so as to present a fluent and logical continuity between thought and action, a quality which is strictly bound with the thinking ability of the characters. The outcome of this close interrelation between the segments of the narrative action and the characters' effectiveness in transforming thought into action, is an inner fluency and perfected economy of the narrative development.
As to syntax and lexicon, a much more skilful proficiency is discemible in this novella in comparison with the Novellino tale. Its sentence constructions are diversified and present mostly hypotactical correlations between principal and secondary propositions, together with basic rhetorical devices, such as alliteration, assonance, and pure repetition, which accentuate even rhythmically the central theme of the novella, that is, the opposition between Saladin's miseria and Melchisedech's fortuna. The second part of the exordium, in fact, previously quoted, shows a whole period equally balanced on an apparent comparison formed by two parts rhythmically equal - two hendecasyllables plus a septenarius - but semantically antithetical: "sì come la sciocchezza . . . così il senno"; which is further empbasized by another central antithesis between altrui of the first part - impersonal, anonymous, and with a negative connotation - and il savio of the second part, which, so specifically used in tbc singular form, prepares positively for the character of "il savio giudeo." At the same time, in each part of this antithetical comparison, we discover other antitheses, such as, in the first part, the actions of trae versus mette and the conditions of felice stato versus grandissima miseria. These correspond nearly word by word to the antitheses in the second part, provided by the actions of trae versus ponIo and by the conditions grandissimi pericoli versus grande e sicuro riposo. In this way a semantic balance is ecaffirmed of actions and conditions in the alternation of a mythical time.
Proceding now to the discussion of the narrative action of the novella, we seem to recognize that this is the most essential structural element in the narrative. In fact, the Decameron novellas appear to unfold through three narrative moments which convey: (1) a specific initial situation; (2) one or a series of transformational actions, through which (3) a final changed situation is produced. To illustrate this statement, the novella of the King of Cyprus (1, 9), one of the simplest novella structures in the Decameron, may provide a corroborating example. The initial situation (1) is supplied by the king's cowardice, which is in the second moment (2) bitterly denounced by the "donna di Guascogna" with the end-result (3) of transforming the king from a coward into a just and courageous man. Action, then, as the essential element of tbc narrative movement, corresponds in the Decameron novellas to the transforming function operated by an agent on an object. In the previously discussed novella of the king represents the object of the transformational action, while the "donna di Guascogna" is the transformational agent, and the function is the change from a coward to a courageous man which corresponds to the transforming action accomplished by the agent-donna upon the object-king.
Another example may be found in one of the most complex novellas of the Decameron, such as VIII, 7, the novella of the "scolaro e la vedova." Here the basic structure moves through a narrative action in three times with a repetitive pattern that provides for the complexity of tbc novella. In a first narrative moment, it is the vedova who acts as the agent of a transformational action upon the scolaro whereby he is transformed from an initial condition of "in love" into a final one marked by hate and vengeance. In the second narrative moment, then, it is the scolaro who acts as agent of the vendetta action which transforms the vedova from a beautiful and naively credulous lover into a physically ravaged creature cured from love and its cruelly playful inspirations.
While in the novella of the King of Cyprus, only one course of transformational action was performed by the "dorma di Guascogna" as the agent upon the king as the object, in the novella of the "scolaro e la vedova" the transformational process has taken place through a repetitive pattem that alternates agent and object in a more complex way. The tbree moments, however, that convey (1) an initial situation, (2) a transformational action, and (3) a final changed situation, are present in both novellas, whether simply structured or not.
In the novella of Melchisedec and Saladin, the transformational process is also present and assumes a rather interestingly complicated forin. In fact, in a first moment it is Saladin who acts as the agent of a potentially transforming process by which Melchisedec as the object would be transformed from a miser into a generous donator of money. In the second moment of the narrative, instead, we are faced with a change, whereby Melchisedec from object becomes agent and with the device of the "novellina within the novella" counteracts Saladin's move and transforms the latter into the object of bis own move; that is, he becomes, instead of a self-centered tyrant, a generous and friendIy sovereign. The ftnal situation, then, shows the outcome of this double move: Melchisedec, as the object of the first transformational action accomplished by Saladin, abandons avarice and offers all his fortuna to Saladin, eliminating thus the latter's initial miseria; Saladin, in turn, as the object of the transformational action performed by the savio giudeo, abandons self-interest, sincerely opens bis mind to Melchisedec, and eventually offers the latter is everlasting friendship and protection. The final moment of the novella shows, according to the general arinosphere of the First Day of the Decameron where the novella belongs, a vision of balance and order neatly contrasted with the initial moment where a conflict is clearly afoot and society is presented as obviously disunited.
5 To stress this point a little further, let us consider what is used here as a specific narrative transformational device, that is, the novellina of the three rings, an example that reproduces a certain situation very similar to the actual one presented in the novella itself. At the same time, the novellina besides being a paradigmatic rendering of a certain narrative situation, also funetions as a narrative travestissement,6 inasmuch as Melchisedec thereby suggests a parallel between the three faiths of Saladin's question and the three rings of his novellina, so that these latter are clearly the raves1issement of the former. In terms of its function, both within (in the novella) and without (in the Decameron), Melchisedec seems in this way to point out a certain flaw in Saladin's behavior without directly rebuking him. This travestissement, therefore, besides fulfilling a relevant function in the narrative development of the story, underlies also an important social law highly relevant to the whole context of the Decameron. Through the travestissement of the "novellina within the novella," a socially inferior character succeeds in fact in correcting a person of a higher social status without directly expressing a reproachful statement, which, if expressed, would have infringed upon a clearly established social law. Saladin, through the "novellina within the novella" is actually brought to recognize his own selfish and devious purposes and openly amend them. From a social point of view, then, the travestissement of the novellina permits correction of an injustice without any social law being violated.7 By this further implication, one more element is shown of the strict interrelationship constantly present between the microcosm of a decameronian novella and the macrocosm of the Decameron as a whole.While our topic is certainly not exhausted by this discussion, we still may posit some conclusions. We realize that there are various notions generally accepted as to the essence of the novella, its generai format, content, and message. As to the general format, for instance, the novella is usually seen as a brief narrative composition centered about a single event or situation or conflict, laying stress primarily upon the event itself and its effects upon a person or a group of persons; moreover it appears usually connected with other similar narrative compositions, often strung together with the help of a cornice, or frame. 1 The content usually present incidents and events drawn from real life and reflecting a world wellknown to its audienee for whose entertairiment and improvement the message is unfolded.
These tentative suggestions may help to view the problem of the
novella in general terms. They, however, do not focus ori the distinctive traits of a Boccaccio tale as it appears in the Decameron, which is instead what we have been trying to do with this specific study of the novella I, 3 discussed comparatively in relation to Novellino LXXIII. The following are therefore the more specific points we have arrived at, at the conclusion of this critical inquiry:
l. A decameronian novella centers on action, which develops throug three narrative moments conveying:
(a) an initial situation
(b) one or more transformational actions, accomplished by one
or more agents upon one or more objects
(e) a final situation, produced by the transformat’onal action (b).
2. The second narrative moment (b) is the most important in the development of the action and the novelty of each novella consists in the transformational device used in this particular phase of the narrative process.
3. The inner construction of the novella creates a constant flow of the narrative from one novella to the following, especially through a two-part exordium that provides a link between the previous novellas while preparing for the ones to come.
4. The main characters are described inasmuch as their specific characteristics are funetionally involved with the actions they will be performing in the narrative process.
5.Syntax and lexicon are carefully employed to allow a precise flow of description which develops thought into action without useless interruptions.
6. From Points 4. and 5, one can deduce most clearly that conciseness and essentiality are two of the main qualitics of the decameronian novella. Rarely do wc find long apologies, or exaltations of virtues, or reprehensions of vices; the few we find, are however strictly correlated with the action of the novellas and to the specific atmosphere of the day to which they belong, such as the First, the Fourth, or the Tenth.
7. Finally, by way of epilogue, the constant interrelation is reaffirmed of each novella with the atmosphere and tone of its day and with the general message and moral of the Decameron as a whole, which is obviously a work intended to create a fictional worid capable of influencing positively the society of its readers.
In conclusion, the decameronian novella may, therefore, be considered a specially construed structure, deeply related to the whole of the work and to the tone and mood of the specific day to whIch it belongs. Frorn within it is carefully built on three narrative moments through which its essential element - the action - evolves. Specifically, it is the second Inoment, where the transformational process is realized, that constitutes the central narrative nucleus. Here the main characters - agents and objects - reveal their inner characteristics as participants in th’s process, through movements which are carefully and precisely controlied by an accurate use of syntax and lexicon.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
Los ANGELES
1 Besides the classic works of Letterio di Francia, La Novellistica, 1 (Milano, 1924); and of Salvatore Battaglia, "Dall'esempio alla novella," La Coscienza letteraria dei Afedioevo (Napoli, 1965), pp. 487-547; some significant works that deal with the definition of a Decameron novella in strictly narrative terms, are those of Victor SkIovskij Letture del Decameron: Dal romanzo d'avventura al rotnanzo di carattere (Bologna, 1969); and of Tzvetan Todorov, Grammaire du Decameron (Paris, 1969).
2 It is the famous tale of the three rings, for which sce Americo Castro's essay "The Presence of the Sultan Saladin in the Romance Literatures," Diogencs, 8 (1954), 13-36.
3 For the Novellino all quotations are from the Gualteruzzi text (Torino, 1948). Novella LXXIII is at pp. 142-44. All italics in this article are mine.
4 All quotations from Decameron are from the edition by Vittore Branca (Firenze, 1960), 2 vols. Novella, 1, 3, is at pp. 74-78 of vol. I.
5 I have discussed this very point in an essay dedicated to the First Day Of the Decameron: "Saggio di lettura della Prima Giornata del Decameron," Teoria e Critica, 1 (1972), 111-38.
6 See Todorov, op. cit., pp. 35-36.
7 The same holds true for novella 1, 7, where Bergamino used the example of Primasso in bis "novellina within the novella" to correct Can Grande's sudden attack of avarice without directiy reproaching him.
8 The cornice is considered one of the "four most characteristic elements" of the novella by Robert j. Clements in his essay "Anatomy of the novella," Comparative Literature Studies, IX, 1 (March 1972), 3-16. Mr. Clements' approach focuses on a more general interpretation of the novella "as an autonomous genre," as he himself puts it; while this writer's interest centers ori the inner, specifically narrative quiddity of a decameronian novella. The other three most characteristic elements that Mr. Ciements comments on, are: "the days-nights unity, the word length, and its separable components of theme and subject niatter" (p. 4).
9 As implied at the beginning of this study, the basic definition of the decameronian novella here postulated is indecd flexible enough to be applied also t0 other novella forms.
From the brief discussion of Novellino LXXIII, it may in fact be intimated that the novella structure in that collect'on of novelline is not identifiable either through Point 1, or 2, or 3; while, instead, Points 4 and 5 prove to be valid descriptive items to be adopted with some reductice process.
1f we then apply the same prospect of a definition to Sacchetti's novella structure in the Trecentonovelle, we notice that Point 1 is certainly applicable in this case, but with an important differentiation. Here the most significant narrative moment is lc, rather than Ib, as it is the case for the decameronian novella, since the narrative interest of a Sacchetti novella rests on the changed final situation of the activating process rather than on the transformational moment: see, e.g., novellas LIII, the story of Berto Falchi, la forese, and the famous botta; CLIX, the adventures of the "cavallaccio di Rinuccio di Nello"; CC, the tale of the orsa tied up at the church bell ropes, etc. Morcover, Point 3 is not applicable to this specific novella structure, neither are Points 6 or 7; while, however, Points 4 and 5 can be applied satisfactorily with some restrictions. Other novellas of different authors and different times can undergo the same process of definition, with the favorable prospect of arriving at relevant deductions as to the essential quiddity of cach novella structure involved, as well as to the narrative essence of the novella genre as a whole. At this time, I am working at a forthcoming comprehensive study in this direction of the Italian novella from the 13th to the 17th century.