October 13th, 2008

I've just read Dante's Inferno and I am enthralled by the character for Calandrino.
Boccaccio has Calandrino's gullibility act as his downfall in Decameron VIII. In the beginning of the story, Calandrino overhears Maso del Saggio and his friends talking about precious stones and their respective special attributes. He is very interested in the whereabouts of the stones and asks Saggio about them. How Boccaccio has Calandrino actually believe the extravagance of the area that Saggio describes and then believe that one of the stones grants invisibility is mocking the character and it actually is hilarious, but at Calandrino's expense. After he tells Bruno and Buffalmacco about a plan to obtain the stones, Bruno suggests that they wait to search for it because it being daylight and such. This was another hit to Calandrino, because Bruno's statements about the light affecting the hue of the stones and of people catching on and trying to find the stone too were just nonsense to stall time. We know this because Bruno and Buffalmacco are in on the joke besides the fact that his reasons are silly, and it further exemplifies the gullibility of Calandrino.