Page:Matteo Bandello - twelve stories (IA cu31924102029083).pdf/19

 alien soil and sheltered by the Church, the novelist's boldness might have been punished with tragic speed. The meagre details of his life leave us at least with the conviction that Bandello was a man of scholarly attainments. We know that he produced a version of the Hecuba of Euripides, that he made several translations from the Latin, and that he had amassed materials for the construction of an important Latin dictionary, which were among the manuscripts lost when the Spaniards sacked Milan. He also wrote love-sonnets and canti in ottava rima to his patroness, Lucrezia Gonzaga. But these counted only as interludes, as trifles by the way. It was by his novels that he determined to achieve a reputation, and with unfailing diligence and zeal he made them the serious business of his life.

The interest roused by the Decamerone and by 's tales may have encouraged Bandello to win success in the same field. The novella was the fashionable pastime of the moment, and Bandello sought to make his collection of tales remarkable for their vividness and force. Above all he desired to base them upon actual fact. "These novels of mine," he says, "are not fables but true histories." From Masuccio he doubtless took the idea of dedi-