Matteo Bandello, who dies at about seventy-six…
September 1561 CE
Matteo Bandello, who dies at about seventy-six on September 13, 1561, leaves two hundred and fourteen short stories, each of which is preceded by a dedicatory letter to a famous personality of the time.
Written from 1510 to 1560, Bandello’s stories are collected under the title Novelle, which are to become extremely popular.
They belong to the same genre as Boccaccio’s Decameron and Marguerite of Navarre’s Heptameron.
The common origin of them all is to be found in the old French fabliaux, though some well-known tales are evidently Eastern, and others classical.
Bandello’s novellas are thought the best of those written in imitation of the Decameron, though Italian critics find fault with them for negligence and inelegance of style.
The stories on which William Shakespeare is to base several of his plays (Romeo and Juliet and Twelfth Night in particular) are supplied by Bandello, probably through Belleforest and Pierre Boaistuau, whose stories will be translated into English by William Painter.