Five Comedies from the Italian Renaissance

A fresh translation of five important and popular comedies from the Italian Renaissance, along with an introduction addressing the texts, their translation, and the social and cultural world of Renaissance comedy.

At the turn of the sixteenth century, Italian playwrights rediscovered and recast an old art form―the ancient Latin comedy―to create witty, ribald, and intricately plotted plays that delighted Renaissance audiences with their clever reversals of gender and class roles. Five Comedies from the Italian Renaissance brings together the best of these works in lively new translations by Laura Giannetti and Guido Ruggiero, who also place the comedies in their cultural and social context. Presenting a fresh perspective on the Italian Renaissance, these deft translations allow modern readers to experience the original artistry and carnivalesque humor of these delightfully profane and irreverent literary classics.

The five plays: The Comedy of Calandro by Bernardo Dovizi de Bibbiena; The Mandrake Root by Niccolò Machiavelli; The Master of the Horse by Pietro Aretino; The Deceived by the Academy of the Intronati of Siena; and A Venetian Comedy by anonymous

Guido Ruggiero is professor and chair of the Department of History at the University of Miami. He is coeditor and cotranslator of Five Comedies from the Italian Renaissance, also published by Johns Hopkins, and author of several books, including Sex and Gender in Historical Perspective; Binding Passions: Tales of Magic, Marriage, and Power at the End of the Renaissance; and The Boundaries of Eros: Sex, Crime, and Sexuality in Renaissance Venice.