![]() ![]() The framework of the Decameron serves to show the drastic cultural shifts occurring, in part due to the pestilence, that further spur forward the acceptance of this rising merchant class in society. ![]() The Decameron, through its one-hundred tales told over the course of a ten-day adventure, taken by seven young ladies and three young men, presents the reader with examples of pre, during, and post plague societal perceptions and norms. But overall, critics do little to link the plague to the positive change in society’s acceptance of these merchants and tradesmen. While some critics interpret depictions of the plague within The Decameron, others argue that Boccaccio’s merchant portrayals are more favorable than in previous literature. He also goes on to portray the devastating effects of death on, not only the physical bodies of people and animals, but also on their mental, emotional, and spiritual states, and how this accelerated their acceptance of the rising merchant mentality of more utilitarian values. In The Decameron, Boccaccio depicts the outbreak’s high-mortality rates and how that was a catalyst for many social and cultural changes within fourteenth-century Europe. It is probable that the structures of many of the tales date from earlier in his career, but the choice of a hundred tales and the frame-story lieta brigata of three men and seven women dates from this time. Giovanni Boccaccio was a contemporary witness to the effects of the Black Death pandemic, the Yersinia pestis bacterial pandemic in Europe between the years 1346-53, causing 75 million to 200 million deaths across the continent alone. Boccaccio began work on The Decameron around 1349. ![]()
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![]() ![]() ![]() Amy knows that she can't expect total goodness. It's that simple and because Amy is seven and because she says so, that is exactly what happens to Old Witch. If she does not mend her ways and follow the rules and stay on the glass hill then she will not be allowed to celebrate Halloween. If she can learn to be good she can come down from the hill of glass on Halloween night and behave like a proper Old Witch and do lots of delightfully wicked things. Of course she has her broom and pointy black hat and her black cat, Old Tom. At first Amy allows Old Witch nothing but the few things she can create by magic in such a barren and bleak place like a rickety old house with a front porch, a rocking chair and a few herbs for dinner. There's really no telling what evil thing she will do next so Amy banishes Old Witch to a remote and barren glass hill and forbids her to leave it. ![]() Old Witch eats rabbits whole and dances hurly-burlies and casts wicked abracadabras and reads from a thick old book filled with magical runes. They first hear of Old Witch, who is the head of all the witches in the world, in stories that Amy's mother loves to tell them. ![]() They love to draw and they spend a lot of their time making drawing after drawing of witches. Amy and Clarissa are two little girls who are best friends and they are fascinated with all things magical, especially witches. Enough is enough! Old Witch is banished or "banquished" as seven year old Amy pronounces it. ![]() ![]() She was identified as a Champion of Change by the Obama Administration. She was named a Forbes 30 Under 30 for Law and Policy. Haben’s fight against ableism has resulted in her receiving numerous accolades. The biggest barrier I face is ableism, the widespread beliefs and practices that value nondisabled people over disabled people.” 1 When asked how she overcame her disability, Haben responded, “My disability is not something I’ve had to overcome. Having graduated magna cum laude from Lewis and Clark College with a Bachelor of Arts degree, Haben went on to become the first deafblind person to graduate from Harvard Law School. ![]() ![]() Born deaf and blind in Oakland, CA, to immigrant parents from Africa, Girma is a lawyer and disability rights activist. ![]() How does she communicate? How does she get around? How… how does she do life? These were just a few of the questions that came to mind when I learned the story of Haben Girma. ![]() ![]() We end up knowing a little about all of them but not much about anyone in particular.Īdding to the sense of distance is a subplot that doesn't add much except 50 pages. ![]() But by the time we've met everyone, it's hard to figure out who to focus on - a problem the author seems to wrestle with a bit, too. ![]() To his credit, Sanford tries to make all of them interesting. It takes planners, henchmen, brokers, exporters and importers. It opens with crooks stealing two rare tigers from a zoo with the intention of selling their organs on the black market for traditional Asian medicine. It's a typical Sandford work in that the plot starts quickly and moves briskly. He almost makes up for this with a terrific third act, but by then he's fighting an uphill battle. In "Escape Clause," the newest crime thriller featuring detective Virgil Flowers, we're well past the midway point before Sandford puts some oomph into his malefactor. It's the bad guys, different in each installment, who offer the potential for creating intriguing new characters. ![]() Once a protagonist has been established, there's only so much more that can be added in successive books. ![]() One of the keys to John Sandford's success as a serial author is his ability to take us inside the twisted psyches of his villains. ![]() ![]() ![]() In meta terms, both texts mirror the professional stage of each composer, ‘The Tempest’ is Shakespeare’s last play and arguably chosen by Atwood for retelling as someone also reaching for their final ‘chapter’. ‘Hag-Seed’, Margaret Atwood’s post-modern retelling of Shakespeare’s 17th Century play ‘The Tempest’, retains this central tenet in its narrative to suggest to modern audiences the uncontrollability of our lives due to psychological and physical constraints. ![]() Although societal structures have evolved over the last 400 years, the battle between agency and entrapment remains. ![]() Atwood’s reimagining of ‘The Tempest’ examines the conflict between entrapment and agency with fresh eyes. Adrienne Rich When We Dead Awaken: Writing as Re-Vision 1971 Central to human nature is an individual's desire for agency in the face of societal forces that entrap. ![]() |