The Renaissance book

I have been reading the book on renaissance for three-four days now. Still I do not remember the name of its author. It is an out and out academic book, like a research thesis. I had kept it aside first thinking it will be too boring. I now find it more interesting than I had expected. The chapter I am reading now is on the three major literary figures of early renaissance, Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio. I had a vague idea of Dante, but was totally blanc about the other two.

Petrarch it seems had only contempt for Dante's work, considering him and his vernacular (Italian) poetry fit only for the unschooled vulgar classes. He did not even have a copy of the Divine Comody till Boccaccio sent him one. Petrarch was quite orthodox in his views on religion and morality. However, this did not prevent his fathering one or two illegitimate children. Petrarch and Boccaccio were great friends. Boccaccio's Decameron is a collection of roguish tales, narrated in a village setting outside Florence when Florence itself was under the grip of a plague. Boccaccio had justified writing such scandelous stories on the argument that there is nothing that should not be said if said in good language.