"Les quinze joyes de mariage" by Antoine de La Sale is a satirical prose work published anonymously in the mid-15th century. Parodying a popular devotional text about the Virgin Mary's joys, this work presents fifteen darkly comic tableaux of marriage's "joys"—actually its terrible misfortunes. Through vivid dialogues and realistic scenes, it depicts cunning wives, foolish husbands, and the supreme tragedy of losing one's freedom to matrimony's trap. Written in a lively, conversational style, each chapter unfolds as a mini-story exposing the pitfalls of married life with ironic amusement. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
