Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
A fast-paced narrative about the world-famous libertine Giacomo Casanova, from celebrated biographer Leo Damrosch The iconic libertine Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) was a storied adventurer through the Enlightenment's shadowy underside. Known as a serial seducer, he was also an aspiring priest, an army officer, a fortune teller, a con man, a violinist, a mathematician, a Masonic master, an entrepreneur, a diplomat, a gambler, and a spy. The first to tell his own story, in his massive autobiography Histoire de Ma Vie, he recorded at least a hundred and twenty love affairs, as well as dramatic sagas of duels, swindles, arrests, and escapes. He knew kings and an empress, Catherine the Great, and most of the famous writers of the time, including Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin.
Drawing on seldom used materials, Leo Damrosch situates Casanova fully in the multiple subcultures he inhabited. Reading Casanova's memoir with a critical eye and engaging extensively with his non-autobiographical writings, he brings alive this extraordinary figure and the eighteenth-century world that Casanova knew so intimately. Casanova aspired to a life of freedom from restraints, but, Damrosch asks, freedom at whose expense?
Synopsis
A fast-paced narrative about the world-famous libertine Giacomo Casanova, from celebrated biographer Leo Damrosch "The excellence of Leo Damrosch's energetic biography is that it reveals so many other dimensions of this remarkable man: pioneering autobiographer, questioner of received ideas, traveler through high culture and low."--Jonathan Bate, author of Radical Wordsworth
Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) was a storied adventurer through the Enlightenment's shadowy underside. Known as a serial seducer, he was also an aspiring priest, an army officer, a fortune teller, a con man, a magus, a violinist, a mathematician, a Masonic master, an entrepreneur, a diplomat, a gambler, a spy--and the first to tell his own story. In his vivid autobiography Histoire de Ma Vie, he recorded at least a hundred and twenty affairs, as well as dramatic sagas of duels, swindles, arrests, and escapes. He knew kings and an empress, Catherine the Great, and most of the famous writers of the time, including Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin.
Drawing on seldom used materials, Leo Damrosch situates Casanova in the multiple subcultures he inhabited. Reading Casanova's memoir with a critical eye and engaging extensively with his non-autobiographical writings, he brings alive this extraordinary figure and the eighteenth-century world that Casanova knew so intimately. Casanova aspired to a life of freedom from restraints, but, Damrosch asks, freedom at whose expense?
Synopsis
A fast-paced narrative about the world-famous libertine Giacomo Casanova, from celebrated biographer Leo Damrosch "A nuanced, deftly contextualized biography of an adventurer, an opportunist, and a man of voracious appetites . . . another top-notch work from Damrosch."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"The excellence of Leo Damrosch's energetic biography is that it reveals so many other dimensions of this remarkable man: pioneering autobiographer, questioner of received ideas, traveler through high culture and low."--Jonathan Bate, author of Radical Wordsworth
The life of the iconic libertine Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) has never been told in the depth it deserves. An alluring representative of the Enlightenment's shadowy underside, Casanova was an aspiring priest, an army officer, a fortune teller, a con man, a magus, a violinist, a mathematician, a Masonic master, an entrepreneur, a diplomat, a gambler, a spy--and the first to tell his own story. In his vivid autobiography Histoire de Ma Vie, he recorded at least a hundred and twenty love affairs, as well as dramatic sagas of duels, swindles, arrests, and escapes. He knew kings and an empress, Catherine the Great, and most of the famous writers of the time, including Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin.
Drawing on seldom used materials, including the original French and Italian primary sources, and probing deeply into the psychology, self-conceptions, and self-deceptions of one of the world's most famous con men and seducers, Leo Damrosch offers a gripping, mature, and devastating account of an Enlightenment man, freed from the bounds of moral convictions.
Synopsis
A fast-paced narrative about the world-famous libertine Giacomo Casanova, from celebrated biographer Leo Damrosch "Fully succeeds in communicating that 'vivid presentness, ' that 'joyful eagerness' for life, which is what keeps us reading Casanova--and reading about him."--Gregory Dowling, Wall Street Journal
"A nuanced, deftly contextualized biography of an adventurer, an opportunist, and a man of voracious appetites . . . another top-notch work from Damrosch."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
The life of the iconic libertine Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) has never been told in the depth it deserves. An alluring representative of the Enlightenment's shadowy underside, Casanova was an aspiring priest, an army officer, a fortune teller, a con man, a magus, a violinist, a mathematician, a Masonic master, an entrepreneur, a diplomat, a gambler, a spy--and the first to tell his own story. In his vivid autobiography Histoire de Ma Vie, he recorded at least a hundred and twenty love affairs, as well as dramatic sagas of duels, swindles, arrests, and escapes. He knew kings and an empress, Catherine the Great, and most of the famous writers of the time, including Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin.
Drawing on seldom used materials, including the original French and Italian primary sources, and probing deeply into the psychology, self-conceptions, and self-deceptions of one of the world's most famous con men and seducers, Leo Damrosch offers a gripping, mature, and devastating account of an Enlightenment man, freed from the bounds of moral convictions.