Post date: Apr 2, 2017 11:54:02 PM
To start, I should go through my various emotions while reading this: "oh wow this guy understands wome- oh wait never mind" and "wow women can't be left alone at all. tragic. [looks outside to SMC]" were me during the introduction. During the stories themselves my main thought was, "why are you so obsessed with 'vices' and sex? why are these sex stories so male-centric and how the hell are the 7 ladies listening okay with the guys saying these things?" We haven't heard yet from the ladies, nor their stories, but the fact that many of the stories that physically repulsed me were laughed at by everyone makes this a rather interesting take on female sexuality and plays into the 'looser' morals Boccaccio describes in his introduction.
But that isn't really what interested me. The scene and what they do to pass the time is more compelling. The place they settle into is a pastoral paradise. Flowers bloom, sunlight creates the perfect shade, random servants and buildings are there to care for everyone's whim, and fountains bubble merrily. It sounds more like a pre-Raphaelite painting than something that actually exists. It's like they've frozen time in order to create a paradise within the plague ridden hell that is the middle of the 14th century. It mimics the idyllic nymphs and satyrs playing games in the woods, wild and young and carefree, with a lot of bawdy humor. It's Arcadia or Eden in it's timelessness and perfection.
The fact that they choose to tell stories and play games here interests me. When the world is ending, or seemingly anyways, they use entertainment and stories about "love" (according to Boccaccio at least) to fight against the sadness of death. It reminds me of the idea that humans tell stories as a way to stay human, as "survival is insufficient." These young adults don't just want to survive, they want to experience life, a theme that many people strive for when death closes in. A book I read over the summer, Station Eleven, does something similar with a traveling troupe who perform Shakespeare and music for survivor communities. Humanity only exists if we let it, and a part of that is fostering community and replicating society and culture, even when all seems lost.
I don't understand the story choices, nor who these people depicted are, but I do understand why they do what they do and I suppose that is all I can ask for. Apocalypses come in many forms, and here, the young characters fight against it through stories and life.
*A quote from the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Survival Instinct" as well as a phrase used multiple times in Station Eleven. I just realized that Voyager also plays with isolation and the loss of the world, as the Voyager will never get back to the Federation.