![]() Both are witty, ambitious, and on the make. In public, he helps set off her beauty – and in private, he is her confidant, close friend, and shrewd and coarse conversational partner. Where Fiammetta is perfect-looking, Bucino is not only a dwarf but is also quite ugly. Our narrator is Bucino Teodoldi, who is the loyal companion, business partner, and pimp of Fiammetta Bianchini, a 23-year-old courtesan whose clientele are the most elite of the upper classes. ![]() As she flees Rome and has to rebuild her livelihood in Venice, the reader gets a well-researched and de-glamorized look at the intrigue, politics, beauty, superstition, and dirt that define the Renaissance world around her. ![]() Set in 16th-century Italy, the novel traces the career of an expensive courtesan modeled on the woman portrayed in Titian’s famous painting “The Venus of Urbino,” and the associates and lovers who form her social circle. In the Company of the Courtesan is a historical novel published in 2007 by Sarah Dunant. ![]()
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