top of page
This site was designed with the
.com
website builder. Create your website today.Start Now
BookCover FINAL 6-14-16.jpg
CLICK ON THE CLIZIA COVER
AND GO DIRECTLY TO AMAZON.COM

CLIZIA

A Tale of Scandalous Surprises from the Italian Renaissance

LUST, and particularly SEXUAL LUST, one of the Seven Deadly Sins, is the key theme and motivating force throughout CLIZIA, H.D. Greaves’s novelization of Niccolò Machiavelli’s bawdiest and most scandalous comedy.

​

Deliberately written in an elegantly old-fashioned style to mirror the intricacies of the Italian Renaissance, Greaves’ adaptation vividly shows this unusual tale still possesses considerable power to shock, surprise, and amuse—five centuries after it first appeared!

​

We are introduced to CLIZIA, a beautiful little orphan, who has been raised by a wealthy and respected family as their foster daughter. All is well until she turns sixteen and matures into a succulent young woman, all innocent virginal sexuality.

This condition enflames her foster brother — as well as her foster father! — with both of them rabidly desiring to sexually possess the young woman.

​

Sofronia, wife and mother, aware of their dangerous folly, must find a way to bring her husband back to his senses, as well as discipline her errant son. Success in returning integrity and decency back to the family depends on her use of a shocking sexual deceit — just one of many unusual surprises — with CLIZIA’S ultimate fate hanging in the balance.

​

An irreverently humorous look at Renaissance mores — so very different from today’s! — CLIZIA is generously filled with outrageously droll, ribald, and robust Machiavellian misadventures.

​

LUST, it would seem—and as we who are wise well know—is never out of fashion.

 

 

 

 

 

​

EXCERPT FROM CLIZIA

​

     With Cleandro and Nicomaco out of the house for at least a week, and most likely two, searching fruitlessly for Clizia in what Sofronia laughingly called “the wilds of Perugia,” and with Clizia locked safely away in the convent, the lady of the house sat in the shade of her veranda, in a cosy chair, and secure, she felt, from the prying eyes and ears of the neighbours.

     There, enjoying a glass of wine with Doria, she said, “And before he left, what did my dear husband say to me? He said that upon his return, he was going to speak with Friar Timoteo about some important matters. I can guess, of course, what those matters are.

     “This Friar Timoteo, whom you know, Doria, my husband thinks is some kind of little saint, a real miracle worker. Nicomaco tells me that sometime last year this same Friar Timoteo, through prayer and only-God-knows what else, though I’ve no doubt that that ‘what else’ involved a lot of money, performed a miracle.”

     “A miracle?” a sceptical Doria asked.

     “Yes, a miracle! You see, this saintly Friar Timoteo got a young wife, who was supposed to be barren, pregnant.”

     “What kind of miracle is that?” scoffed Doria. “A priest making a woman pregnant? Why, that happens all the time. Now, if some old nun, some old Sister Bathilda, and as ugly as sin, had made the young wife pregnant, that would be a miracle!”

​

bottom of page