KidLit Forum

I have really enjoyed the stories I have read from Il Pentamerone by Giabattista Basile. When reading the first story, the one which holds the other ones together, I thought that this would be a nice story to tell to the children, due to the fact that I enjoyed the style and the plot. However, when I got to the first story, “The Myrtle”, I changed my mind due to the cruelty of the scene when the 7 wicked women attack the fairy and the erotic details in the conversations between the two lovers.
After reading “The Three Citrons”, I noticed that the style of the stories are different, which I found remarkable. Even if the main story states that there are different story tellers, I did not expect to see different styles.

What I noticed in the two stories, is the fact that the main female hero, the one who conquered the Prince, was always a fairy, a fair, beautiful, innocent creature. For me it was nice to see the connection between the ideal feminine image and nature (the citron, the dove, the citron tree and the myrtle) and the beautiful way they were described and loved by the princes. However, I could not help but think that this was setting a standard which was almost impossible to reach for women. These fairies were magical, pure and their beauty was incomparable to any other creature’s. So, what happens if you’re a regular girl, with flaws and dark hair? Another thing that caught my attention was the fact that the princess from the main story had to shed all those tears to wake up the prince, which, in my opinion, revealed the fact that a woman was expected to sacrifice herself for the man in her life. Still, the fact that the princess set of on her journey on her own, proved that she was independent and smart enough to find her own happiness, even though she lacked wisdom at first, when she laughed at the old woman.

The thing which I found new, compared to what I had read before, was the fact that the opponent was a black slave. In both “The Three Citrons” and the main story, the black slave woman was presented as cunning, jealous, stupid and even cruel. I found this fact interesting and revealing towards the mentality of that times. Still I could not help but feel a little bit angry because of the fact that they attributed the villain role to black people, which were, in fact, the ones who had to endure cruelties in real life.
The way the villain was punished, was again new to me. In “The Myrtle” and “The Three Citrons” the punishment is uttered by the villains themselves, when asked what punishment would their deeds deserve, which I found very interesting.

When it comes to family, I found the relationship between mother and daughter in “The Myrtle” to be very touching. The way the woman takes care of the tree, providing the most beautiful pot and the best caring for it, only to give it to a Prince to take care of it, at his insistent requests, this is a beautiful metaphor of the love a mother gives to her girl, taking great care of her, and giving her up in order for her to find her happiness through love and asking the future husband to take great care of her.