About the work
Novela od Stanca is a carnival comedy by the Dubrovnik playwright Marin Držić. He wrote it in 1550 for the wedding of the Dubrovnik nobleman Martolica Džamanjić, where the play also had its premiere.
Plot
On a Dubrovnik carnival night, a group of boisterous young men set out to trick old Stanac, a peasant who has come to town to sell goats and odds and ends. Posing as sorcerers, they claim they can turn him into a donkey, a bird or a flea; frightened, Stanac instead begs to be turned into a twenty-year-old youth — and the tricksters pretend to oblige.
Cultural significance
Novela od Stanca is the only one of Držić's works to survive in complete form, and with its earthy slapstick and the vulgarisms of its carousing youths it stands as one of the earliest examples of farce in Croatian-language theatre. It remains among Držić's most frequently staged plays on Croatian stages today.