Giacomo Casanova - The Memoirs of Casanova (Illustrated Edition)

Giacomo Casanova

(Illustrated Edition)

The Incredible Life of Giacomo Casanova – Lover, Spy, Actor, Clergymen, Officer & Brilliant Con Artist Translator: Arthur Machen

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musaicumbooks@okpublishing.info2017 OK Publishing ISBN 978-80-7583-378-5

Casanova at Dux Casanova at Dux Table of Contents

Translator's Preface

Author's Preface

Volume 1. Venetian Years

Episode 1. Childhood

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Episode 2. Cleric in Naples

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Episode 3. Military Career

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Episode 4. Return to Venice

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Episode 5. Milan and Mantua

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter XXIII

Volume 2. To Paris and Prison

Episode 6. Paris

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Episode 7. Venice

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Episode 8. Convent Affairs

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Episode 9. The False Nun

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter XXIII

Chapter XXIV

Chapter XXV

Episode 10. Under the Leads

Chapter XXVI

Chapter XXVII

Chapter XXVIII

Chapter XXIX

Chapter XXX

Chapter XXXI

Chapter XXXII

Volume 3. The Eternal Quest

Episode 11. Paris and Holland

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Episode 12. Return to Paris

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Episode 13. Holland and Germany

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Episode 14. Switzerland

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Episode 15. With Voltaire

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Volume 4. Adventures in the South

Episode 16. Depart Switzerland

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Episode 17. Return to Italy

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Episode 18. Return to Naples

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Episode 19. Back Again to Paris

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Episode 20. Milan

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Volume 5. In London and Moscow

Episode 21. South of France

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Episode 22. To London

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Episode 23. The English

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Episode 24. Flight from London to Berlin

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Episode 25. Russia and Poland

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter XXIII

Volume 6. Spanish Passions

Episode 26. Spain

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Episode 27. Expelled from Spain

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Episode 28. Return to Rome

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Episode 29. Florence to Trieste

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Episode 30. Old Age and Death of Casanova

Appendix and Supplement

Part the First. Venice 1774-1782

I. Casanova's Return to Venice

II. Relations with the Inquisitors

III. Francesca Buschini

IV. Publications

V. Mlle. X . . . C . . . V. . .

VI. Last Days at Venice

Part the Second. Vienna-Paris

I. 1783-1785

II. Paris

III. Vienna

IV. Letters from Francesca

V. Last Days at Vienna

Part the Third. Dux — 1786-1798

I. The Castle at Dux

II. Letters from Francesca

III. Correspondence and Activities

IV. Correspondence with Jean-Ferdinand Opiz

V. Publications

VI. Summary of My Life

VII. Last Days at Dux

Table of Contents

The Memoirs of Casanova, though they have enjoyed the popularity of a bad reputation, have never had justice done to them by serious students of literature, of life, and of history. One English writer, indeed, Mr. Havelock Ellis, has realised that 'there are few more delightful books in the world,' and he has analysed them in an essay on Casanova, published in Affirmations, with extreme care and remarkable subtlety. But this essay stands alone, at all events in English, as an attempt to take Casanova seriously, to show him in his relation to his time, and in his relation to human problems. And yet these Memoirs are perhaps the most valuable document which we possess on the society of the eighteenth century; they are the history of a unique life, a unique personality, one of the greatest of autobiographies; as a record of adventures, they are more entertaining than Gil Blas, or Monte Cristo, or any of the imaginary travels, and escapes, and masquerades in life, which have been written in imitation of them. They tell the story of a man who loved life passionately for its own sake: one to whom woman was, indeed, the most important thing in the world, but to whom nothing in the world was indifferent. The bust which gives us the most lively notion of him shows us a great, vivid, intellectual face, full of fiery energy and calm resource, the face of a thinker and a fighter in one. A scholar, an adventurer, perhaps a Cabalist, a busy stirrer in politics, a gamester, one 'born for the fairer sex,' as he tells us, and born also to be a vagabond; this man, who is remembered now for his written account of his own life, was that rarest kind of autobiographer, one who did not live to write, but wrote because he had lived, and when he could live no longer.

And his Memoirs take one all over Europe, giving sidelights, all the more valuable in being almost accidental, upon many of the affairs and people most interesting to us during two-thirds of the eighteenth century. Giacomo Casanova was born in Venice, of Spanish and Italian parentage, on April 2, 1725; he died at the Chateau of Dux, in Bohemia, on June 4, 1798. In that lifetime of seventy-three years he travelled, as his Memoirs show us, in Italy, France, Germany, Austria, England, Switzerland, Belgium, Russia, Poland, Spain, Holland, Turkey; he met Voltaire at Ferney, Rousseau at Montmorency, Fontenelle, d'Alembert and Crebillon at Paris, George III. in London, Louis XV. at Fontainebleau, Catherine the Great at St. Petersburg, Benedict XII. at Rome, Joseph II. at Vienna, Frederick the Great at Sans-Souci. Imprisoned by the Inquisitors of State in the Piombi at Venice, he made, in 1755, the most famous escape in history. His Memoirs, as we have them, break off abruptly at the moment when he is expecting a safe conduct, and the permission to return to Venice after twenty years' wanderings. He did return, as we know from documents in the Venetian archives; he returned as secret agent of the Inquisitors, and remained in their service from 1774 until 1782. At the end of 1782 he left Venice; and next year we find him in Paris, where, in 1784, he met Count Waldstein at the Venetian Ambassador's, and was invited by him to become his librarian at Dux. He accepted, and for the fourteen remaining years of his life lived at Dux, where he wrote his Memoirs.