Mrs Rosie and the Priest (final review!)
Review by Katie Lipoma
*Spoilers ahead & content warning for murder, rape, and abuse*
My final Booked & Busy read was Mrs Rosie and the Priest by Giovanni Boccaccio, one of the many books that make up the Penguin Classics collection. I’ve never naturally gravitated toward classics and often find that I don’t enjoy them as much as I should, but this book’s subject matter and short length kept me captivated all the way through (even if it was offensive at times).
I was also surprised to discover that this book is divided into four short stories that are part of Boccaccio’s larger work, Decameron: “Andreuccio da Perugia’s Neapolitan adventures,” “Ricciardo da Chinzica loses his wife,” “Mrs Rosie and the Priest,” and “Patient Griselda.” Each of these stories highlight different characters, plots, and themes. Additionally, the translation from Italian to English is interesting as I feel that it likely dims Boccaccio’s original meaning and impact, and often fell flat at times. However, I loved reading about (and recognizing) the various places in Italy and some traditional Italian names. This book is definitely a product of its time (estimated to have been written between 1349 – 1353) and the book is chock-full with historical gender roles and traditions, sexism, and predatory behavior toward women and made me pretty uncomfortable.
These four stories are very much different yet the same. They clearly depict gender roles and the expectations of women and men during this time as well as the mistreatment of women and Italy’s patriarchal societal structure (a lot of this system is shockingly still present in Italy today and is reflected in every aspect of daily life!). Furthermore, the themes of these stories include sex and adultery, trickery and misfortune, and marriage with an emphasis on the concepts of ownership and duty. Additionally, all of these stories revolve around religion, but interestingly feature characters that go against everything the Catholic Church stands for.
“Andreuccio da Perugia’s Neapolitan adventures” is my favorite story in this book. The descriptions are the most visceral and the main character, Andreuccio, is the most complex and compelling. He finds himself on some odd adventures that involve being tricked into thinking he is woman’s brother, falling into a pile of poop at an adult worker’s home and losing all his money, being lowered into a public well and hiding from night guards, and climbing into the Archbishop of Naples’ tomb and stealing his ring to resell before being tricked again and trapped in the tomb. I like this story the most because I can see the transformation of Andreuccio’s character. He starts as a swindler, but is strangely naive and embodies several character contradictions. Readers go from hating him to empathizing with him to hating him to empathizing with him again and again. It’s an adventure that engages our emotions and I can appreciate that.
My least favorite story is, funnily enough, “Mrs Rosie and the Priest.” This is because it reminds me a lot of the incidents of misconduct and abuse that many people experience at the hands of priests and religious personnel who are intended to protect and comfort. Like the priest in this story, many of these abusers commit heinous acts in the name of religion. In short, the priest seeks out Mrs. Rosie Hues due to her beauty and his vulgar desire for her after he watches her husband leave town. After Mrs. Rosie tells the priest to leave her alone, he coerces her into having sex with him through guilt, and provides her with his expensive jacket, claiming that he simply wants to “love his neighbor” in the name of the Lord. However, it’s clear that he doesn’t see her as a whole person and uses lots of vile language that I will certainly not be repeating. The story ends with Mrs. Rosie’s husband returning home and the priest demanding that Mrs. Rosie return his jacket. Readers are left feeling for both Mrs. and Mr. Hues, as her husband says that the priest can have anything of theirs and that he is a man of God and deserves the utmost respect, ultimately blaming his wife for the priest’s unhappiness and keeping the jacket in her possession. Mrs. Rosie never speaks about her experience, and readers can infer that fear and guilt are holding her back…similar to the cases we hear about today.
“Ricciardo da Chinzica loses his wife” was not very interesting and left me feeling sad. In a nutshell, a woman named Bartolommea decides to cheat on her husband because he doesn’t have sex with her enough. After believing that his wife has been abducted when she has just left him for another man, he rushes to Bartolommea’s aid where she pretends not to recognize him. When they’re alone, she then cruelly tells her husband that he never does enough for her and doesn’t value her beauty enough unlike her new boyfriend. Although the husband does all that he can to prove his love for Bartolommea, he eventually dies of a broken heart while Bartolommea gets married to the man that she just met. Strangely, this is the one story in the book that depicts a woman having complete authority over a man, thus completely reversing the expected gender roles.
Lastly, “Patient Griselda” is a very strange story and reminded me a lot of a fable gone wrong. A wealthy ruler, Gualtieri, is pressured into marriage by his subjects although he despises the idea of finding a wife and having children. To put an end to the pressure, he decides to randomly select a woman on the basis of her beauty to be his wife. She lives in poverty and works as a laborer for her father. In a inhumane way to attempt to test her patience and loyalty to him after thirteen years of marriage (which she previously declared before marrying him), he puts her through several extremely difficult situations (i.e. pretends to kill their two newborn babies, pretends to divorce and shame her in public, and makes her clean his entire palace for the wedding with his “new wife”). Through these acts, he wants to see that she doesn’t cry and “react like a typical woman,” making her worthy of his love and commitment. When he sees that she has passed all his tests and believes she is patient and loyal, he remarries her and introduces her to their children, which he previously sent off to live with relatives. This story definitely has a shock factor, and I feel badly that this wonderful woman was subjected to such cruelty by the man who promised to love her until the end. He took advantage of her background and economic status and hurt her in numerous ways. The atmosphere of conditional love that Gualtieri creates is matched the woman’s grace and genuine love, and reflects the sad expectations and roles that accompany this time period.
Thank you so much for reading this week’s review! I would love to give a huge thanks to those who have been following along since September! Farewell and stay “booked!”
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