Keen and Violent Remedies

The <I>Novellino</I> of Masuccio Salernitano, long known for its gruesome scenes of violent humor and horror, is arguably the most important collection of short stories in Italian renaissance literature after the <I>Decameron</I>. This study, the first thorough analysis of the tales in English, explores the hidden literary, political, and cultural background of Masuccio’s mordant satire. It uncovers the <I>Novellino</I>’s sources, from the French fabliaux to Catalan poetry, from the Bible to Boccaccio, and examines the reflections of aristocratic fears in fifteenth-century Naples regarding the growing mendicant movement and the Turkish threat from the East. This volume closes with a new consideration of the modern theories of the grotesque and presents a convincing alternative to a Bakhtinian reading of Masuccio’s classic work.