Contested

The Decameron

by Giovanni Boccaccio

Ten young Florentines escape the plague of 1348 to a villa in the hills and tell a hundred stories in ten days: lovers, tricksters, saints and lecherous friars. In 1559 it went on the Church’s first Index of forbidden books, and for years afterwards was printed only in purged editions. Chaucer and Shakespeare both borrowed from it.

The librarian

Read it in the Library After Dark Or read it as plain text

Reading time

About 20 hr 35 min

Where to find it

The Unwelcome Spines, beyond the Restricted Catalogue

Edition

Project Gutenberg, eBook #23700. In the public domain in the United States.