Decameron Blog #5

7:5 Question --- What do the narrator’s words in the prologue of the story tell us about how the society viewed the relationship between husband and wife? Has our society progressed from this viewpoint? Regressed?

This story is very different in the sense that this is the first time we see the man being so jealous over the wife which causes her to stray.  In previous story, it was, stereotypically, the wife who was jealous over the husband and his actions.  The prologue that the reader is given at the beginning of this story really sets the tone for the rest of the plot.  Here we have a man who controls every single action that his wife makes.  He monitors her daily, and to him, she cannot have any type of happiness that is not related to him.  In a way, this story makes it appear that in society it was perfectly acceptable for the man to hold the power in the relationship.  Implying, jealousy is okay for the man, but not okay for the woman.  Therefore, men can control women as much as they want to keep their jealousy a bay.  Clearly, Boccaccio does not agree with this.  The wife is far more clever in this story, and Boccaccio advocates that if a partner is too jealous in a relationship, then infidelity is inevitable.  To be quite frank, our society has not progressed much from this.  Even centuries later, there are still relationships were one partner is overbearingly jealous which causes the other partner to stray.  For instance in the 1950's, men had complete control over their wives.  In society, the wives had to stay home and disregard anything that could give them personal pleasure.  Therefore, one sees this theme of control still in modern society.