History of Casanova. Casanova - who is this? History of Giacomo Casanova

Giacomo Casanova was not a poor man

In the history of the development of mankind, there are names that have become common nouns, which is the name. When one of the men is called by this name, it immediately becomes clear that this person is literally a real red tape who does not miss "a single skirt."

This is exactly what Giovanni Giacomo Casanova was, born in sunny Venice on April 2, 1725. The boy was the offspring of an artist who, being married to a colleague in the craft, sinned and gave birth to a child from the director of the theater in which she performed. A year later, she tried to get rid of the child and gave him to be raised by her grandmother. And she again began to roam in other people's beds - well, apparently the little Casanova got not the best genetics on the maternal side and affected his entire future fate.

From his parents, he inherited a love for the theater, an art in which he was well versed as an adult. But let's get back to the childhood and adolescence of the young offspring of artists. While still small, eleven years old, he already knew what sexual desire was and quite seriously planned to marry a young lady who was only two years older than him. Of course, the marriage was not destined to take place, because the teenager went to school in Padua and entered the university here, where he studied law.

He spent his youth in fun and friendship with such people as the Count of Lyon and the Abbé Burney. At the same time, a courtesan meets on his way, who managed to make a magnificent lover out of Casanova. She let him know that only by being able to satisfy a woman can he allow himself to be satisfied. Having taught him all the possible techniques that can excite a woman and bring her to orgasm. Her merit is that Giacomo Casanova used sex toys all his life, so he had a prototype of a modern dildo made of wood and covered with leather. The love of spying on other people's sexual acts and anal sex came later.

Casanova and Theological Seminary

But Casanova is 17 years old and he becomes a doctor of jurisprudence, after which he decides to enter the theological seminary. But it was not there! Casanova could not finish it, overwhelmed by lust, he showed an exorbitant interest in the female sex and was in no way suitable for the role of a priest. Moreover, he was also seen in homosexual relationships with one of the seminarians. For numerous love affairs, he was simply expelled from the seminary, and a year later he managed to get into Fort San Andrea, but his own intrigues were to blame.

Rumors about his talent as a lover spread fairly quickly, and young and not-so-young women struggled to get their hands on Casanova. Yes, and he did not refuse anyone, using not only their bed, but also generosity - he never disdained any gifts from a generous female hand - whether it was gold coins or jewelry with diamonds. True, one of the love affairs ends sadly - he is expelled from Venice.

How his life would have turned out if not for these circumstances is unknown, but being expelled from Venice, Casanova went on a trip, first in Italy, and then in Europe, where he managed to visit Paris. A few years later, he was granted mercy, they returned to their native city, and now, having already known the love of women and treated kindly by the attention of Senator Bragadino, Casanova in 1746 begins to play music, and becomes a violinist in the Senator's house and, of course, successfully seduces women.

An irresistible craving for travel and adventure haunts the young and full of strength man, and at the age of 28 he again goes to Europe, this time to Vienna, Dresden and Prague. But the fidget Casanova always strove for his native city and his path again lies in Venice. As you can see, Casanova did not remember the laws of Venice very well, because soon he again ends up in prison, accused of blasphemy and fraud. And in the same year, 1756, he manages to escape from prison and leave Venice incognito.

Casanova - French secret agent

Portrait of Giacomo Casanova

At that time, his friend of youth, Abbé Bernie, received a rather significant post - the Minister of Foreign Affairs of France. Remembering his friendship with Casanova, he invites him to Paris with only one goal - to make a secret agent out of the last. Well, Bernie's plan was a success and gradually Giacomo Casanova becomes one of those people who are actively involved in diplomatic activities, especially since all the doors of the women's bedrooms were open for him, and he was entered into any of the houses, his fame of a first-class lover.

The adventurer Casanova even managed to become director of the French lottery and open his own manufactory. It would seem that everything was going well, he leads a secular life, is engaged in speculation, has enough funds, but two years later everything suddenly ends at the moment when Bernie loses his post as minister and the Duke de Choiseul takes his place.

Traveling around Europe again, uncertainty, random money, fate entered the stage of a dark streak, which did not end even after returning to Paris. This time, in 1759, he was sent to the French prison of Fort-l'Eveque. In Paris, he ran into debts, and, as you know, you can’t always run away from them. It would not have been Casanova if he had not managed to get out of prison two days later, but at what cost? Secret mission to Holland, that's what he agreed to for freedom.

A year later, he is already sent to Germany, where he manages to visit Cologne and Stuttgart, but even here he has no peace from creditors, they are chasing him, but the clever adventurer still manages to slip away from them and get to Paris through Switzerland. A year later, he was again in secular society and politics, as evidenced by the fact that he represented Portugal at the Augsburg Congress.

Casanova loved not only women, but also a beautiful life, and debts followed him everywhere, even when he was in London, from which he had to flee for this reason. Here was another, one of the most striking love stories of Casanova and the courtesan Chaipion. It ended very badly - a complete lack of money and flight.
And here again a visit to Germany, where in Berlin he was introduced to King Frederick the Great. The king invites him to enter the military service and take command of the cadet corps, but Casanova does not want to be tied to one place at all, so he prefers to refuse the place. Boredom, boredom ... She again drives him on the road, and he is again going on the road.

Casanova in Russia

And in 1765, Casanova decided to visit Russia and see Moscow and St. Petersburg. Here he is presented to the then reigning Catherine II. The queen did not share the general delight of the ladies from meeting the intriguer, she did not like him, and therefore he did not manage to get positions at court.

In Russia, too, there was a love adventure, which for him was the acquisition of a peasant woman for 100 rubles. He saw her when one day he was walking with a new friend, officer Stepan Zinoviev, along Yekaterinhof. The beauty of the girl struck and forced her to pursue the fugitive to the very house, where she managed to hide. Serfdom made it possible to buy a girl, about which the Venetian agreed with her father.

Nyura, or, as Casanova called her in his memoirs, Zaira, was extremely smart and after three months of communication, she spoke quite well in Italian and, in addition, learned all the tricks of love. He dressed her in the most fashionable dresses, taught her manners, made her a completely well-bred girl. Zaira also had a drawback - she was a terribly jealous person and once almost killed an Italian by throwing a bottle at him.

Time flew by unnoticed and the eternal wanderer Casanova was drawn to change, but he could not just take and return the girl he had completely changed back to his parents in a peasant hut. Then he decides to arrange her future fate and “attaches” her to the architect Rinaldi, a 70-year-old man who soon died, leaving his entire fortune to Zaire.

Casanova in Europe

Casanova loved many women, but not for long. Sex sport 🙂

And Casanova again got ready to travel, this time to Poland. In Warsaw, he is favored by the king and rotates in high society, but his proximity to the theatrical world played a cruel joke on him - a conflict arose with Count Bernadtsky because of the actress, which ended in a duel and Casanova's flight from the country.

Casanova is again wandering around the European states, which change one after another - new people, new places, mistresses. Wherever he appeared, his activities were somehow connected with espionage, since he was a member of the highest circles of all states. During this journey, while in Spain, he was twice imprisoned, but as usual, he did not stay there for long.

In 1770, his friend Bernie became a cardinal, their friendship was renewed and, of course, Casanova returned to Italy, but he received permission to return to Venice only five years later.

Arriving in Venice, he becomes an agent, and this time not of the government, but of the Inquisition, having simultaneously received the position of director of the theater. Antonio Pratolini - that was his name in denunciations for the Inquisition.

The restless Casanova again could not stay in one place, and literary activity, the publication of the pamphlet "No Love, No Women" became the reason for his new flight from Venice, in addition to another novel. Having ridiculed the top of the Venetian society in a pamphlet, he thereby sentenced himself to exile. This time he decides to go to Austria and the Czech Republic.

The stiffness of the Austrian court and its ladies, who were excessively proud of their virginity, was incomprehensible and ridiculous for the libertine, however, as for any Italian. He did not like it at all here, however, there was nothing to do - he had to live somewhere.

A year later, he returns to his beloved city, constantly rejecting him like a foreign body. This was the last visit to Venice, after which he goes to Vienna, taking the post of secretary of the ambassador, and there he meets Count Waldstein. The friendship between them leads to the fact that the count invites Casanova to leave for his estate, to which he agrees.

Count Waldstein was fond of alchemy and magic, and therefore Casanova not only works for him as a librarian, but also takes part in the experiments of the count with his characteristic curiosity.

This was the last journey that Casanova made. By the time he went to live on the estate of the count, he was no longer interesting to the ladies - having grown old and having spent all his sexual energy, he could only claim a connection with some simple lady of advanced age.

old age casanova

It is surprising that with such a stormy life, Giacomo Casanova died a natural death, not in a duel and not in prison.

Giacomo Casanova lived a fairly long life, and always wrote his memoirs, but from the age of 49, stories of love affairs disappear. Apparently by this age, he was no longer able to satisfy any woman. Hundreds of love affairs are attributed to him, in fact, he never set out to count them. A good connoisseur of female psychology and a master of flirting, he appreciated the opportunity to turn a woman's head, the game of seduction gave no less pleasure than intimacy. His success is also explained by the fact that he gave every woman a little, but a piece of love, and not just sex, and his memoirs are permeated with a slight sadness of parting, and tenderness for each of them. But in addition to love adventures, the memoirs contain many descriptions of life situations and those people with whom he happened to be acquainted, including both mere mortals and the monarchs ruling at that time.

Being an educated and versatile person, Casanova wrote several literary works during his life, these are “History of Troubles in Poland”, and the novel “Icosameron”, the comedy “Molukkeida”, the translation of Homer’s “Iliad” and a number of other translations of French novels and his own writings. Casanova's works were published frequently, but they were constantly modified, sometimes getting rid of various passages, sometimes changing their meaning, and genuine memoirs were published only in the 60s of the last century.

He died immediately, on the estate of Count Waldstein at the age of 73, (July 4, 1798). An old, sick and lonely old man who left his indelible mark on the history of mankind, as the most talented seducer, unsurpassed lover, writer, adventurer and philosopher, spy and freemason, sharpie and duelist, a man of indefatigable passions and a sharp mind.

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Casanova Giovanni Giacomo

Casanova Giovanni Giacomo

Italian writer. Author of historical works, fantastic novel "Icosameron" (1788). In the memoirs "The Story of My Life" (vols. 1-12, written in 1791-1798, in French, published 1822-1828) - Casanova's numerous love and adventurous adventures are described, characteristics of contemporaries and public mores are given. He had varied interests.

Casanova (Giovanni Giacomo Casanova de Sengalt - a title of nobility that he appropriated to himself) comes from Venice. The actors' son had an unhappy childhood. After studying law, young Giacomo wanted to take holy orders, but became entangled in love affairs and was expelled from the seminary. Having visited Naples, Rome, Constantinople, Paris, he returned to Venice, where he was imprisoned in 1755 for deceit and blasphemy. In 1756 he fled to Paris, where he won a special position for himself by magic. After long wanderings around Europe, he arrived in Berlin, received an audience with Frederick the Great. He could take the post of head of the cadet corps, but preferred to go to St. Petersburg, where he met with Catherine II, after which he left for Warsaw, from where he fled because of a duel with Count Branitsky. Then he wandered around Europe, experiencing many adventures everywhere. In 1782 he settled in the Czech Republic, in the castle of Count Waldstein, with whom he studied cabalism and alchemy.

Casanova's "Don Juan List" can only strike the imagination of a very exemplary family man: 122 women in thirty-nine years. Not so much - three love affairs a year. At that time, a list of love luck was an indispensable attribute of a secular dandy, it was compiled with great care, memorized, a brilliant "track record" provided new victories.

Love was one of the highest meanings of Casanova's existence, and it made him great. But his novels did not end with a wedding, the reward of virtue and the debunking of vice. Natural feeling is free and infinite; in itself is its justification. "I loved women to the point of madness, but I always preferred freedom to them."

Casanova willingly engaged in a psychological game with women, amused, intrigued, embarrassed, lured, surprised, extolled (such, say, his adventures with Mrs. F. in Corfu, K.K. in Venice, Mademoiselle de la Mour in Paris). “By persuading the girl, I persuaded myself, the case followed the wise rules of foolishness,” he wrote about the victory won thanks to improvisation. He flattered, sometimes just molested until he achieved what he wanted. For the sake of beautiful eyes, he moved from city to city, put on a livery to serve the lady he liked. But more often everything happened much easier, as with Mimi Kenson: "I became curious whether she would wake up or not, I myself undressed, lay down - and the rest is clear without words."

It combined a sublime feeling and carnal passion, sincere impulses and monetary calculations. Casanova bought the girls he liked (most of all he liked young thin brunettes), taught them the science of love, secular courtesy, and then, with great benefit for himself, gave way to others - financiers, nobles, the king. You should not take at face value his assurances of disinterestedness, that he only did what made the happiness of poor girls - it was a constant source of income for him. However, the society itself dictated to him the norms of behavior. Louis XV turned France into a huge harem, beauties arrived from all over and even from other countries, parents brought their daughters to Versailles - suddenly the king will pay attention during a walk. And the young O'Morphy got from the hands of Casanova into the bed of the king thanks to a portrait painted from her, which the monarch liked (a fabulous story about love from a portrait turned into a completely modern story about choosing a girl from a photograph).

With some, he had philosophical conversations, and one even gave a whole library. He slept with aristocrats, with prostitutes, with nuns, with girls, with his niece, maybe with his daughter. But in all his life, it seems, not a single mistress reproached him for anything, because physical intimacy was not just a pastime for him.

One day in Venice, Casanova picked up a letter on the stairs that Senator Bragodin had dropped.

Casanova Giovanni Giacomo

The noble senator invited Casanova to take a ride with him. Dear Bragodin became ill, and Giacomo carefully brought him home. The senator sheltered his savior, seeing in him a messenger of mysterious forces, in the existence of which he deeply believed. Casanova settled in the house of a benefactor and began to engage in magic at his leisure. The victims of his tricks complained to the authorities, but he surprisingly easily shied away from responsibility. And yet, on charges of witchcraft, the Venetian police imprisoned him in the Piombi prison, famous for its horrors, under the lead roofs of the Doge's Palace in Venice.

However, Casanova did not master magic in vain. It is difficult to say what role supernatural forces played here, but exactly at midnight on October 31, Casanova left the casemate, which was locked with many locks. In an impregnable Venetian dungeon, he cut a passage to a lead roof. The flight of Casanova made a lot of noise in Europe and brought fame to the adventurer.

Therefore, Paris enthusiastically met the young rake, especially the Parisian celebrity - the Marquise d'Ufrey, who was crazy about his big black eyes and Roman nose. Casanova, with his inherent sense of humor, convinced the marquise that when she turned 63, she would have a son, she would die, and then she would be resurrected as a young girl. Apparently, the Marquise was inclined to believe Giacomo, who in the meantime took possession of her millions and, fleeing the Bastille, hastened to Voltaire in Fern.

He evaluated states in terms of the success of his adventures. He was dissatisfied with England: in London, he was robbed by a Frenchwoman, Charpillon, and her husband almost killed Giacomo.

Who was Casanova anyway?

At different times, the famous adventurer gave himself different certifications. He presented himself as a Catholic priest, a Muslim, an officer, a diplomat. In London, he once said to a woman: "I am a libertine by profession, and today you have acquired a bad acquaintance. The main business of my life was sensual pleasures: I did not know a more important matter."

"Love is a search," Casanova wrote in his declining years. There was no end to his search. Giacomo remembered some women not without a hint of contempt, others with a sense of gratitude.

With particular tenderness, Casanova recalled Henriette, who loved him dearly - judging by her letters and after the death of Giacomo - who, parting with her lover in Geneva, inscribed with a diamond on the glass in a hotel room: "You will forget your Henriette ..." After reading this inscription through thirteen years old, Casanova pleaded unworthy of her. When, many years later, after escaping from a Barcelona prison, he went to bed in Aix, in the south of France, a caring sister of mercy, sent to him by Henriette, who lived on her estate, was on duty at his head.

Casanova was not like Don Juan. Vengeful commanders, jealous husbands and embittered fathers did not pursue him. The happy women did not besiege Giacomo with letters and complaints. What is the secret of his charm?

Casanova was handsome, considerate and generous. But, most importantly, he talked, talked, talked about everything in the world: about love, about medicine, about politics, about agriculture. It was as if he knew everything and everyone and always followed the principle that F. La Rochefoucauld formulated much earlier: an intelligent person can be in love like a crazy person, but not like a fool.

If there was no common language, then he refused love. He was once offered to spend the night with the famous courtesan Kitty Fisher, who demanded a thousand ducats a night from an ordinary client. Casanova refused, because he did not know English, and for him love without communication was not worth a penny.

Already in the middle of his life he felt satiety. More and more failure awaited him. In London, the young courtesan Charpillon harassed him, constantly pulling out money and refusing caresses, and the great seducer ran out of steam. "On that fateful day in early September 1763, I began to die and ceased to live. I was thirty-eight years old." He began to be content with easy victories: public girls, tavern maids, bourgeois women, peasant women, whose virginity could be bought for a handful of sequins. And at the age of fifty, out of economy, he went to middle-aged and unattractive women, lived like a wife with a modest seamstress.

Casanova Giovanni Giacomo

But the more irreversibly his sexual energy left, the more intense his intellectual activity became. He took up literary work. At the end of his life, he wrote his memoirs "The Story of My Life", which were met with mixed reviews.

Each episode described is very colorful in itself, its authenticity is undeniable - Casanova seems sincere, and the memoirs give the impression of a document.

Casanova, as is quite clear from his memoirs, sought to have sexual intercourse with one woman in the presence of another. So it was with Helen and Hedwig, two girls whom he simultaneously deprived of their virginity.

"I enjoyed with them for several hours, going from one to the other five or six times before exhausting myself. In the breaks, seeing their submissiveness and lustfulness, I forced them into difficult poses from the Arstino book, which amused them beyond measure. We kissed each other to all the places they wanted. Hedwig was delighted, she liked to watch."

It seems that Casanova attributed to the girl his own morbid interest in copulation.

The same was the case with Annette and Veronica. “Veronica yielded to her younger sister and took on the passive role that she imposed on her. Pulling away, she bowed her head on her hand, presenting my gaze with breasts that could excite the most indifferent of people, and suggested that I launch an attack on Annette. It was not difficult, because I was on fire and was ready to please her for as long as she pleased. Annette was short-sighted and in the midst of the action could not see what I was doing. I managed to free my right hand so that she did not notice it, and I was able to to give her a piece of pleasure, although not as sharp as her sister experienced. Meanwhile, the veil was knocked off, Veronica took the trouble to correct it and, as if by chance, offered me a new spectacle. She did not hide how charms delight me, her eyes sparkled Finally, burning with unsatisfied desire, she showed me all the treasures that nature had bestowed on her, just at the moment when I finished with Annette for the fourth time.She believed that I was rehearsing before the offensive m of the night, and her fantasy played out.

One day, Casanova arranged an "oyster dinner" with champagne for two nuns, Armalliena and Elimet. He heated the room so hot that the girls were forced to take off their coats. Then, having started a game, during which one took an oyster from another directly from the mouth, he managed to drop a piece behind the corset, first to one girl, then to another. The extraction process followed, then he examined and compared their legs to the touch. Interestingly, all this happened during the carnival. Approximately the same thing happened during dinner with Bassi (Casanova's temporary assistant).

"When dinner and wine had significantly lifted my spirits, I paid attention to my daughter Bassi, who allowed me to do whatever I wanted, and my father and mother only laughed. The stupid Harlequin was worried and annoyed, because he could not do the same with his Dulcinea. To at the end of supper I was like Adam before the fall. Harlequin got up and, grabbing his beloved by the hand, was about to drag her into another room. I told him to stay, and he stared at me in complete amazement, but then turned his back on us. His girlfriend, on the contrary, she positioned herself in such a way that I managed not to disappoint her.

The scene aroused Bassi's wife, and she began to encourage her husband to prove his love to her. He answered, and the modest Harlequin sat by the fire, covering his head with his hands.

"Alsatiana was very aroused and used the position of her lover to give me everything I wanted, so I was forced to work hard on her, and the violent convulsions of the body confirmed that she enjoyed as much as I did."

In the case of Bassi, it was important for Casanova that the Harlequin was humiliated and hurt. It was no coincidence that he noted how sweet the feeling of power was for him, how he liked to pay people with whom he had just played with.

Failures in love irritated him and infuriated him. Sharpillon laughed at him, he scratched her, knocked her down, broke her nose - because she rejected his attention. And the case with the "Goudar chair" is absolutely fantastic.

In appearance, the chair was ordinary and very ugly.

Casanova Giovanni Giacomo

However, as soon as a person got into it, "two belts clasped his hands and squeezed them tightly, the other two spread their legs, and the spring lifted the seat."

When Goudard sat down in a chair, “the springs worked and brought him into the “position of a woman in labor.” Casanova mentally admired: this “apparatus” could be used to grab Charpillon and abuse her. Later he abandoned the idea of ​​​​acquiring a chair, but this thought owned his imagination .

Other adventurers were led by greed, they were attracted by fame. For Casanova, both money and fame were only a means. His goal was love. Women filled his life. In 1759 Casanova was in Holland. He is rich, respected, he has an easy path to calm and lasting prosperity. But only meetings, new meetings excited his imagination. He looked for these meetings everywhere: at a court ball, on the street, in a hotel, in a theater, in a brothel. He traveled around the cities without any calculation and plan. His route was marked by a pair of beautiful eyes that lingered on him longer than decency would allow. And for the sake of a pair of beautiful eyes, he was able to dress up as a hotel servant, give feasts, play Voltaire's "Scotch" and settle for a long time in a tiny Swiss town. In a short time he managed to love an aristocrat from high society, the daughters of an innkeeper, a nun from a provincial monastery, a learned girl skilled in theological disputes, servants in Bernese baths, a charming and serious Dubois, some ugly actress and, finally, even her hunchbacked friend . He seduced everyone. He had only one rule: two women are much easier to seduce together than apart.

"Love is only curiosity" - this phrase is often found in Casanova's memoirs. Indefatigable curiosity was the real passion of this man. He was not a banal favorite of women, he was not a happy darling, an accidental dilettante. He treated rapprochement with women the way a serious and diligent artist treats his art.

Casanova was not always immersed in hasty and indiscriminate depravity. Such periods happened to him only when he wanted to drown out the memories of a great love that had just passed and the eternal thirst for a new one. Among the innumerable women mentioned by this "libertine by profession," there are several who left a deep imprint on his soul. The best pages of memoirs are devoted to them. Talking about them, Casanova avoided obscene details. Their images become for the readers of the memoirs as close and alive as the image of the Venetian adventurer himself.

Casanova's first love was in the spirit of a peaceful Venetian novel. He was sixteen years old, and he loved Nanette and Marton, the two nieces of the good Signora Orio. "This love, which was my first, taught me nothing in the school of life, as it was perfectly happy, and no calculations or worries disturbed it. Often all three of us felt the need to turn our souls to divine providence in order to thank him for obvious patronage, with which it removed from us all accidents that could disturb our peaceful joys ... "

A light touch of elegy appeared in his second love. Perhaps this is because it took place in Rome, in the eternal greenery of the gardens of Ludovisi and Aldobrandini. There, Casanova loved Lucrezia. “Oh, what tender memories are connected for me with these places! .. “Look, look,” Lucretia told me, “didn’t I tell you that our good geniuses protect us. Oh, how she looks at us! Her gaze wants to reassure us. Look what a little devil, this is the most mysterious thing in nature. Look at her, probably, this is your or my good genius. "I thought she was delusional. "What are you talking about, I don't understand you, what should I look at?" - "Don't you see a beautiful snake with a shiny skin, which raised its head and seems to be worshiping us?" I looked where she was pointing and saw a snake of iridescent colors, a cubit long, which really examined us."

On the way from Rome to Ancona, Casanova met with the singer Teresa, disguised as a castrato.

Casanova Giovanni Giacomo

In this strange girl there was a nobility and a clear mind that inspired respect. Casanova wanted never to part with her again. Never had he thought so seriously about marriage as that night in the little hotel in Sinigaglia. The unforeseen separation did not change his decision. It took all Teresa's life experience to convince him that this was impossible for both of them. "It was the first time in my life that I had to think before I decided on anything." They parted and met seventeen years later in Florence. Together with Teresa was a young man, Cesarino, like two drops of water similar to Casanova in his youth. Struck by this meeting, Hugo von Hofmannsthal wrote the play "The Adventurer and the Singer".

During his stay in Corfu, Casanova experienced love, reminiscent of the complexity and torment of the themes of modern novels. The long history of this love is dramatic. Many years later, the memory of the patrician F.F. caused Casanova to exclaim: “What is love? It is a kind of madness over which the mind has no power. It is a disease to which a person is subject at any age and which is incurable when it strikes an old man. O love, an indefinable being and feeling! God of nature, your bitterness is sweet, your bitterness is cruel...

No other woman evoked such tender memories in Casanova's soul as Henriette, the mysterious Henriette, whom he met in the company of a Hungarian officer in Cesena. The three months he spent with her in Parma were the happiest time of his life. “Whoever thinks that a woman cannot fill all the hours and moments of the day, he thinks so because he never knew Henriette ... We loved each other with all the strength that we were capable of, we were completely content with each other, we are completely lived in our love." Casanova adored this woman, who on her face "had a slight shadow of some kind of sadness." He admired everything about her - her mind, her upbringing, her ability to dress. Once she played the cello superbly. Casanova was touched, shocked by this new talent of his Henriette. “I ran into the garden and wept there, for no one could see me. But who is this incomparable Henriette,” I repeated with a tender soul, where did this treasure that I now own come from? ..

The incident that made Casanova remember Henriette and the days of his youth happened to him just after his separation from Dubois, which was one of his last great attachments. After this incident, he began to feel lonely. He picked up Rosalia in one of the Marseille brothels. “I tried to bind this young lady to me, hoping that she would remain with me until the end of her days and that, living in harmony with her, I would no longer feel the need to wander from one love to another.” But, of course, Rosalia left him, and his wanderings began again.

Instead of a devoted mistress, Casanova met La Corticelli. This little dancer made him jealous and bitterly deceived. She was from Bologna and "all she did was laugh." She caused Casanova many troubles of all kinds. She plotted against him and cheated on him at every opportunity. But the tone of his stories betrays that never, even at the moment of their final break, this "madcap" was not indifferent to the heart of the adventurer who was beginning to grow old.

Casanova's last novel was in Milan. He was still great then. "My luxury was dazzling. My rings, my snuffboxes, my watches and chains, strewn with diamonds, my order cross of diamonds and rubies, which I wore around my neck on a wide crimson ribbon - all this gave me the appearance of a nobleman." Near Milan Casanova he met Clementine, "worthy of deep respect and the purest love." Recalling the days spent with her, he says: "I loved, I was loved and I was healthy, and I had money that I spent for pleasure, I was happy. I liked to repeat this to myself and laughed at the stupid moralists who assure that there is no true happiness on earth. And just these words, "on earth," aroused my gaiety, as if it could be somewhere else!.. Yes, gloomy and short-sighted moralists, there is happiness on earth, a lot of happiness, and everyone has their own.

It is not eternal, no, it passes, comes and passes again... and, perhaps, the amount of suffering, as a consequence of our spiritual and physical weakness, exceeds the amount of happiness for any of us. Maybe so, but this does not mean that there is no happiness, great happiness. If there were no happiness on earth, creation would be monstrous and Voltaire would be right when he called our planet the cesspool of the universe - a bad pun that expresses absurdity or expresses nothing but a surge of writer's bile. There is happiness, there is a lot of happiness, so I repeat even now, when I know him only from memories.

At parting, Clementine sobbed and fainted. Did Casanova then feel that, saying goodbye to her, he says goodbye to his last happiness. He took the Venetian Marcolina in passing almost from the street. Separation from her caused him unprecedented experiences. “I cannot and refuse to convey the suffering that her departure caused me. Even the day before, I was glad of this separation for many reasons. At the moment of departure, I felt that my desire to free myself from Marcolina was weakening. despair!.. The superficial reader will probably not believe it when I say that I was left standing motionless, seized with anguish and in such oblivion of everything that I did not know how to find the way.I jumped on the horse and, spurring it with all my might, gave himself up to the road with a desperate decision to drive his horse or break his neck. Thus I made eighteen leagues in five o'clock."

And then London. "What loneliness, what lostness... London is the last place on earth where you can live when your soul is sad." There, Casanova met not a beloved female friend, but a most dangerous predator. A Frenchwoman from Besancon, who bore the surname Charpillon, was destined to become Casanova's worst enemy. "So, in London, halfway through earthly life, as old Dante said, love mocked me in the most insolent way."

What an unusual and wild was this love! Casanova fell in love with this woman at first sight. It consisted of cunning, caprice, cold calculation and frivolity, mixed in the most amazing way. She ruined him to the bone and brought him to prison. Once she almost strangled him, another time Casanova inflicted severe beatings on her. In Richmond, in the park, he rushed at her with a dagger. They were either friends or enemies. But here is the last humiliation: Casanova caught her on a date with a young hairdresser. In a perfect frenzy, he destroys everything that comes to his hand. Sharpillon barely managed to escape. Then she got sick. Casanova was told that she was dying. "Then I was seized with a terrible desire to commit suicide. I came to my place and made a will in favor of Bragadin. Then I took a pistol and headed for the Thames with the firm intention of crushing my skull on the parapet of the bridge." A meeting with a certain Edgar saved his life. As always obeying fate, Casanova followed him, and that night ended in an orgy. And the next day he met Sharpillon at a ball among the dancers. “The hair on my head stirred, and I felt a terrible pain in my legs. Edgar told me later that at the sight of my pallor, he thought that I would now fall in an epileptic fit. In an instant, I pushed the audience aside and went straight to her. I began to say something to her, that - I don’t remember. She ran away in fear. This was Casanova's last date with Sharpillon...

After the death of Casanova, he became the hero of numerous literary works, and then films. The great Italian director Federico Fellini showed in his film (1976) a gifted man who tries in vain to use his talents, but in this environment only his sexual energy is in demand...

From a real person, the famous adventurer and lover turned into a myth.

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He was born in Venice in 1725. His parents were actors who allegedly belonged to the famous Palafox noble family. Giacomo was a very gifted young man who first graduated from school in Padua and then began to study law.

prison agony

According to Casanova's memoirs, at the age of thirty he was arrested and sent to Piombi in the "Lead Prison" to serve his sentence for crimes against the holy faith - he was found to have books on magic, including the Zohar.

In prison, Giacomo was placed in the most terrible conditions, where he was exhausted by "hordes of fleas", constant darkness and summer heat. But the torment was softened when, after five months of such a stay, at the personal request of Count Bragadin, he was transferred to other prisoners, where they were given good food, a warm bed and money for books.

Casanova managed to escape from prison and thirty years later he would write a book about this, translated into many languages ​​​​and highly popular - "The Story of My Escape".

Casanova's secret activities

Since his mother was an actress, he moved in secular circles from an early age. In Venice, secrets were well kept from foreigners, so knowing anything was life-threatening. But Giacomo ignored all the prohibitions and was friends with such influential people as the Count of Lyon, Abbe Berni and the French ambassador to the Venetian Republic.

Casanova declared himself a Rosicrucian and an alchemist, but Count Saint Germain himself competed in this:

The young seducer's life changes dramatically after his friend Bernie becomes French Foreign Minister in 1757. In his memoirs, he wrote that Bernie always received him not as a minister, but as a friend, and therefore did not hesitate to ask him to carry out secret assignments. Thus, Giacomo was involved in secret diplomatic activities.

Casanova wasted no time...

Bernie tried with all his might to win the favor of his king, and used Casanova to carry out his plans. Giacomo in his memoirs thus recalls the first secret mission. Bernie informed him by letter that it was urgent to go to Versailles to meet the Abbé de Laville there.

And then he asked if Casanova could visit about ten warships of the French fleet anchored in Dunkirk, and gain confidence in the senior officers there, in order to find out all the important information about the armament of the ships, ammunition, command and number of sailors? Casanova replied to the Abbot that he was ready to try to fulfill his order.

A couple of days later he rented a hotel room in Dunkirk. A local banker, instructed by France, gave Giacomo a hundred louis for expenses, and in the evening presented him to the squadron commander, Monsieur de Bareille. The commander, as expected, first questioned Giacomo, asking a few questions, and then invited him to dinner with his wife, who had just returned from the theater.

The commander and his wife were very helpful and friendly. Casanova did not waste time at the gambling tables and very quickly became acquainted with all the naval and army officers. He talked a lot about the navies of European countries, trying to pass himself off as a great expert in this field. Giacomo really understood this topic, as he served in the navy. A few days later, he not only met the captains of warships, but also made friends with them.

Secret agent revealed all the secrets

Casanova quickly gained confidence, as he himself recalls in his memoirs, sometimes he was talking nonsense, and the captains listened to him with great interest. Soon one of the captains invited Casanova to dine on board his ship. After which he received invitations from the rest of the captains. It only played into the hands of a secret agent.

The captains were so kind to him that they themselves told about their warships like guides. Casanova did not waste time and carefully studied each ship far and wide, did not hesitate to ask questions, according to him, there were always young officers who, wanting to show off, shared valuable information for him.

The officers spoke frankly about their ships, so it was not difficult for the undercover agent to gather all the necessary information to write a detailed report for his friend. Before going to bed, he took notes and wrote down all the advantages and disadvantages of the ship he visited. Giacomo very responsibly approached the fulfillment of the assigned task, was not distracted by flirting and slept only four or five hours a day. His main goal was to carry out a secret assignment.

The secret agent dined most often with Kornman's business partner or with Monsieur P. The latter's wife often accompanied the young seducer and was very pleased with his treatment. Once they were left alone with her, and Casanova showed her all his gratitude ...

End of espionage

After successfully completing the secret mission, he kindly said goodbye to everyone and departed back to Paris, but chose a different route. Having arrived at his destination, Giacomo immediately went to the minister with a report, he deleted everything superfluous from the report, not sparing two hours of his priceless time.

At night, the secret agent rewrote his report and went to Versailles in order to hand it over to the Abbé Laville. He silently read the report, but his face showed nothing. The abbot only asked to wait a bit, after a while he himself would let you know how well the secret assignment was carried out.

A month later, Casanova received the long-awaited answer and five hundred louis. It turns out that the Minister of the Navy really liked the report, he found it not only well-written, but also very informative. But the joy of the secret agent was not complete, some very reasonable considerations prevented him from fully enjoying his success.

The thing is that this secret order cost the Naval Ministry a tidy sum - twelve thousand livres. But the minister himself could easily find out all the information he was interested in and at the same time not spend a single sou.

Also, any young officer, even without being very quick-witted and talented, could, if necessary, give the impression of a very capable person.

Casanova perfectly understood the monarchical bureaucracy, it was such that all the ministers, without stint, threw state money down the drain, generously showering their favorites and protégés.

In 1758, instead of Casanova's friend Abbot Bernie, the Duke de Choiseul became Minister of Foreign Affairs. Unfortunately, after this event, all the espionage activities of the secret agent came to naught.

Memoirs "The Story of My Life"

In 1789, Giacomo began to actively create a work, without which his popularity would not have been so massive - he writes memoirs called "The Story of My Life". He speaks of the work as "the only cure for not going crazy and dying of boredom."

Then he wandered around Europe for a long time, changing one country for another, and only in 1779 did he get a job as a librarian on the estate of Count Waldstein Good-Dux. On June 4, 1798, a secret agent and brilliant lover passed away.

Legend of Casanova

According to legend, the priest who baptized a two-week-old baby with the well-known surname Casanova made a very strange entry in his diary.

“It seems to me that today I baptized the Antichrist himself” - this is exactly the impression the baby made on the priest.

A few days earlier, the same priest had buried a beautiful artist, Casanova's mother, who died during an agonizing birth.

It is not clear why the baby made such a strange impression on the priest? Maybe this was due to the death of his mother or because the boy never cried during the ceremony. In any case, the reasons are not clear. But it is strange that this clergyman died exactly one year later under rather mysterious circumstances...

The boy was brought up by his aunt - the elder sister of his mother. She was a highly educated woman who gave Giacomo a brilliant upbringing and education. She managed to bring up a hypnotizing gallantry in the future hero-lover, which won many women's hearts.

The master of love

• According to legend, Casanova received his first love experience at the age of eleven, from a girl of twelve who served his aunt. By the age of fifteen, the young man was very experienced in matters of love. He had many admirers including noble and adult representatives of the fair sex.
• But there is another legend according to which Giacomo knew all the joys of sex much later - at the age of twenty-one. He rented a prostitute for the night, but due to the lack of love experience, he could not do anything in bed, and then the priestess of love took up his training.

Already after one month of intensive practice, the prostitute spread a rumor about a skillful and virtuoso lover who could brighten up the life of even the most picky of the fair sex. After some time, all the aristocrats dreamed of Casanova, and all the married representatives of the stronger sex lost their appetite and sleep.

At first, the young lover seduced widows and old maids, who had long lost hope of finding a worthy life partner and starting a family. But over time, he managed to seduce about a thousand women who were married to noble aristocrats.

Tragedy Casanova

It turns out that the hero-lover also knew how to love for real. He experienced a cruel tragedy, which, perhaps, became the reason for his frivolous lifestyle.

When he was not yet twenty years old, he had a bride whom he loved very much, but, unfortunately, fate tragically separated them - she died of pneumonia. This blow was so strong for Casanova that he even wanted to commit suicide, but changed his mind in time. After the tragedy, he promised himself that he would never marry anyone.

An interesting fact is that he warned all his women with whom he had an intimate relationship that he was not going to marry and therefore you should not get involved in it seriously. All his numerous novels lasted no more than a month. But at the age of forty, he met a girl who was very similar to his dead bride and fell in love. He broke his vow, married her and never cheated on his wife.

The seducer knew all the secrets of love

Why was Casanova so popular with women, what is the mystery of his many love victories? In fact, he was not handsome and did not possess supernatural male strength. His love victories can be explained by the fact that he was an altruist, that is, he gave pleasure not only to himself, but also to a woman, unlike other men of that time.

The gallant seducer was very fond of making love in unexpected places, for example, on a set dinner table or in a fountain in front of surprised servants. People who knew the hero-lover closely claimed that he knew all the secrets of erotic cuisine.

He knew such recipes that could turn any nun into a promiscuous courtesan. For example, the Marquise de Roy, recalling Giacomo, said that the julienne prepared by him worked real miracles, she, having tasted them, experienced such a passion that she could not quench, even for a whole night of love.

“I have always loved spicy food… As for women, I have always found that the one I was in love with smelled good, and the more she sweated, the sweeter it seemed to me.”

Giovanni Casanova (1725–1798) is the author of numerous historical works, the fantasy novel Ixameron and the memoirs The Story of My Life, in which the great Italian heartthrob not only described his love adventures, but also gave an extensive characterization of the mores of contemporary society.

Casanova (full name Giovanni Giacomo Casanova de Sengalt - a title of nobility that he appropriated to himself) was a native of Venice. The initial interests of the young Giacomo were far from sensual languor. He wanted to take holy orders, but, entangled in love affairs, he could not resist the call of his flesh. The young writer traveled around Europe for several years, after which he returned to Venice, where he was imprisoned in 1755 for deceit and blasphemy. In 1756, Giacomo fled to Paris and then to Berlin, where he received an audience with Frederick the Great. After several more years of wandering, in 1782, the unlucky lover settled in the Czech Republic, in the castle of Count Waldstein, with whom he studied cabalistics and alchemy.

Love in all its manifestations was the highest meaning of Casanova's existence. However, his novels did not end with a wedding, since he valued his freedom more than love. “I loved women to the point of madness, but I always preferred freedom to them,” wrote Giacomo Casanova.

In a love game, Casanova was attracted by the effect that he had on women: he made laugh, intrigued, embarrassed, lured, surprised, extolled (such, say, his adventures with Mrs. F. in Corfu, K. K. in Venice, Mademoiselle de la Mure in Paris). “By persuading the girl, I persuaded myself, the case followed the wise rules of mischief,” he wrote about the victory won thanks to improvisation. For the sake of beautiful eyes, he moved from city to city, put on a livery to serve the lady he liked.

Giacomo was an outstanding personality: he combined a lofty feeling and carnal passion, sincere impulses and monetary calculation. A constant source of income for Casanova was the sale of young girls whom he bought, taught the science of love, and then, with great profit for himself, gave in to others - financiers, nobles, the king. However, do not blame this famous lover for all mortal sins. He was a product of his time, which dictated to him the norms of behavior. Louis XV turned France into a huge harem. Beauties arrived from all over and even from other countries, parents brought their daughters to Versailles: suddenly the king would pay attention to them during a walk.

Casanova taught some girls secular manners, conducted philosophical conversations with them. He entered into intimate relationships with everyone indiscriminately: with aristocrats, with prostitutes, with nuns, with simple girls, with his niece, maybe with his daughter. But none of Casanova's mistresses ever reproached him, since physical intimacy was not the first place in communication with women.

It is known that during his life Giacomo was fond of magic, sometimes devoting all his free time to it. The inhabitants of neighboring houses often denounced him to the authorities, but he surprisingly easily avoided responsibility. Only once, on charges of witchcraft, did the Venetian police imprison him in the Plomba prison, famous for its horrors, under the lead roofs of the Doge's Palace in Venice.

Now it is difficult to reliably say what role supernatural forces played, but Casanova managed to get out of the casemate, from which it was impossible for an ordinary person to get out. In an impregnable Venetian dungeon, he cut a passage to a lead roof. The flight brought the adventurer fame throughout Europe.

It is not surprising that Paris enthusiastically met the young rake. Among the French, captivated by the charm of the great heartthrob, was the Marquise d'Ufrey, who was attracted by Casanova's large bottomless eyes and Roman nose. According to contemporaries, he completely drugged her. With the air of a connoisseur, Giacomo told d'Ufre that when she was 63 years old, she would have a son, she would die, and then resurrect as a young girl. The enchanted marquise did not even notice how deftly Giacomo, meanwhile, took possession of her millions and, escaping from captivity in the Bastille, hurried to Voltaire in the Farm.

He evaluated states in terms of the success of his adventures. He was dissatisfied with England, because in London he lost all his funds because of the enterprising Madame Sharpillon, whose husband almost killed Casanova. Already an elderly man, Giacomo wrote: "Love is a search." Based on this statement, there was no end to his search. Giacomo remembered some women not without a hint of contempt, others with a sense of gratitude.

The characters of Casanova and Don Juan have little in common. The former was never pursued by jealous husbands and embittered fathers. Women did not bother him with their jealousy. What is the secret of his charm? Casanova had an extraordinary appearance, was attentive and generous. But the most important thing is that he knew how to talk about everything in the world: about love, about medicine, about politics, about agriculture.

If Casanova did not find a common language with a potential victim of his charm, then he refused love. Once he was offered to spend the night with the famous courtesan Kitty Fisher, who demanded a thousand ducats per night from an ordinary client. Casanova refused, because he did not know English, and for him love without communication was not worth a penny.

Already at the age of 38, he felt satiety. After the failure with the courtesan Charpillon, he began to be content with easy victories: public women, tavern maids, petty bourgeois, peasant women, whose virginity could be bought for a handful of sequins. Sexual interest began to disappear, and then Giacomo decided to prove himself in the literary field. At the end of his life, he wrote a memoir, The Story of My Life, which generated mixed reviews.

Casanova quite sincerely described each episode of his love affairs, his memoirs gave the impression of a document. As is quite clear from these memories, Casanova could satisfy two women at once. So it was with Helen and Hedwig, two girls whom he simultaneously deprived of their virginity. “I enjoyed them for several hours, going from one to the other 5 or 6 times before exhausting myself. During breaks, seeing their submissiveness and lasciviousness, I forced them to take difficult poses according to Arstino's book, which amused them beyond measure. We kissed each other in all the places we wanted. Hedwig was delighted, she liked to watch.”

One day, Casanova hosted an "oyster dinner" with champagne for two nuns, Armalliena and Elimet. Previously, he heated the room so hot that the girls were forced to take off their outer clothing. Then, having started a game, during which one took an oyster from another directly from the mouth, he managed to drop a piece behind the corset, first Armallyene, then Elimet. The extraction process followed, then he examined and compared their legs to the touch.

Casanova has repeatedly noted how sweet the feeling of power is for him, how he likes to pay people with whom he has just played. Failures in love irritated him and infuriated him. When Madame Charpillon laughed at him, he scratched her, knocked her down, broke her nose, that is, answered in the most cruel way.

For other adventurers, it was considered important to make money or glorify their name. For Casanova, money and fame were only a means to achieve a single goal - love. In 1759 Casanova was in Holland. At that time he was already rich, respected, before him lay an easy path to a calm and lasting prosperity. But this was not what the restless Giacomo needed: new meetings excited his imagination. For the sake of his beautiful eyes, which lingered on him longer than decency required, he could disguise himself as a hotel servant, give feasts, play Voltaire's "Scotch" and settle for a long time in a tiny Swiss town, where in a short time he managed to seduce an aristocrat from high society, the daughters of an innkeeper, a nun from a provincial convent, a learned girl skilled in theological disputes, servants in the Bernese baths, the charming and serious Dubois, some ugly actress, and, finally, even her hunchbacked friend. All his actions obeyed one rule: two women are much easier to seduce together than apart.

Speaking of Casanova, it is impossible to say with certainty that this man was always immersed in hasty and indiscriminate debauchery. It only happened when he wanted to get rid of the pain after breaking up with true love. Among the innumerable women mentioned by this famous libertine, there are several who left a deep impression on his soul. The best pages of memoirs are devoted to them. Talking about them, Casanova avoided obscene details, and their images are created with such vivacity that they become people close to the reader.

Casanova's first love for Nanette and Marton, the two nieces of the good signora Orio, was pure and virgin like the morning dew. “This love, which was my first, did not teach me anything in the school of life, since she was perfectly happy, and no calculations or worries disturbed her. Often all three of us felt the need to turn our souls to Divine Providence in order to thank him for the obvious patronage with which it removed from us all accidents that could disturb our peaceful joys ... "

The love of Giacomo Casanova for the singer Teresa, who traveled in disguise as a castrato, for a long time gave way to pain in the heart. In this strange girl, nobility and a clear mind were combined, which inspired respect. Never had he thought of marriage so seriously as he did that night in the little hotel in Sinigaglia. However, marriage was not possible, and Teresa did her best to convince him of this. “It was the first time in my life that I had to think before deciding on anything,” he wrote in his memoirs.

During his stay in Corfu, Casanova experienced feelings reminiscent of the themes of modern literary works in their complexity and versatility. Many years later, the memory of the patrician F. F. made Casanova exclaim: “What is love? This is a kind of madness over which reason has no power. This is a disease to which a person is subject at any age and which is incurable when it strikes an old man. O love, being and feeling indefinable! God of nature, your bitterness is sweet, your bitterness is cruel…”

Rosalia occupied not the first place in the life of Giacomo, she swept through his life like a bright comet. Casanova picked up Rosalia in one of the Marseille brothels. “I tried to bind this young lady to me, hoping that she would remain with me until the end of her days and that, living in harmony with her, I would no longer feel the need to wander from one love to another.” But, of course, Rosalia left him, and the search began again. Instead of a betrayed mistress, Casanova met La Corticelli. The insidious dancer made him go through the torments of jealousy and deceit. She skillfully wove intrigues against him and cheated on him at every opportunity. But from the tone of his stories, one can judge that always, even at the moment of their final break, this frivolous creature inspired boundless passion in the adventurer who was beginning to grow old.

Casanova's last significant romance took place in Milan. He was then still at the zenith of his fame. “My luxury was dazzling. My rings, my snuffboxes, my watches and chains, strewn with diamonds, my order cross of diamonds and rubies, which I wore around my neck on a wide crimson ribbon - all this gave me the appearance of a nobleman. Walking around the outskirts of Milan, Casanova met Clementine, in his words "worthy of deep respect and the purest love." Speaking about the feelings that overwhelmed him at that time, he wrote: “I loved, I was loved and I was healthy, and I had money that I spent for pleasure, I was happy. I liked to repeat this to myself and laughed at the stupid moralists who claim that there is no real happiness on earth. And just these words, "on earth," aroused my gaiety, as if it could be anywhere else! Yes, gloomy and short-sighted moralists, there is happiness on earth, a lot of happiness, and everyone has their own. It is not eternal, no, it passes, comes and passes again ... and, perhaps, the amount of suffering, as a result of our spiritual and physical weakness, exceeds the amount of happiness for any of us. Maybe so, but this does not mean that there is no happiness, great happiness ... ”The separation from Clementine caused him unbearable suffering, because even then Casanova felt that he was saying goodbye to his last happiness.

In London, Casanova met not his beloved female friend, as he hoped, but the most dangerous predator. A Frenchwoman from Besancon, who bore the surname Charpillon, was destined to become Casanova's worst enemy. It was a fiery and dangerous love! Madame Charpillon was as if woven from cunning, whims, cold calculation and frivolity, mixed in the most amazing way. She ruined Casanova to the bone and brought to prison.

Lovers have repeatedly found out the relationship with the help of beatings. For example, once she almost strangled him, another time Casanova in the park rushed at her with a dagger. Sharpillon dared to cheat on him repeatedly. Once, Casanova caught her on a date with a young hairdresser. Distraught with jealousy, Giacomo began to destroy everything that came to his hand. Sharpillon barely managed to escape.

One day, Casanova was informed that Sharpillon was dying. Recalling this difficult moment for him, Giacomo said: “Then I was seized with a terrible desire to commit suicide. I came to my place and made a will in favor of Bragadin. Then I took a pistol and headed towards the Thames with the firm intention of crushing my skull on the parapet of the bridge. A meeting with a certain Edgar saved his life. What was the indignation and indignation of Giacomo when the next day he met Sharpillon at a ball among the dancers. “The hair on my head stirred, and I felt terrible pain in my legs. Edgar told me later that at the sight of my pallor, he thought that I was about to fall into an epileptic fit. In the blink of an eye, I pushed the audience aside and headed straight for her. I began to tell her something that - I do not remember. She ran away in fear." This was the last meeting with Sharpillon.

After the death of Casanova, he became the hero of numerous literary works, and then films. The great Italian director Federico Fellini showed in his film (1976) a gifted man who tries in vain to use his talents, but in this world only his sexual energy is in demand.

Who is Giacomo Casanova? Some say that he was a writer, translator, lawyer, musician, financier, traveler, diplomat and even a librarian. Others are a dissolute gambler, a duelist, a secret agent, a healer, a soothsayer and a ladies' man. What is the truth of all this? Let's find out in this article.

Childhood and youth of Giacomo Girolamo Casanova

On April 2, 1725, a great joy occurred in the family of actors Gaetano Giuseppe and Farussi Zanetta Casonova - the first-born was born, who was named Giacomo Girolamo.

While his parents were on tour, the boy was raised by his grandmother. At the age of 9 he was sent to a boarding house. This event was a great disappointment for the child. He regarded the act of his relatives as a betrayal and later wrote in his memoirs that in this way "they got rid of me." The conditions in the boarding house were terrible, so Giacomo asked to be placed in the care of the abbe Gozzi, who became his first teacher. The boy lived with Gozzi and his family until 1737. The abbot's house became the place where Casanova fell in love for the first time. He was 11 years old at that time.

“Bettina (Gozzi's younger sister - ed.) was beautiful, cheerful, passionate about reading novels. I immediately liked the girl, although I did not quite understand why. It was she who gradually kindled in my heart the first sparks of that feeling, which later became my main passion, ”Giacomo wrote in his autobiography“ The Story of My Life ”.

Early manifested in Casanova and craving for knowledge. At the age of 12, he entered one of the oldest universities in Europe, the University of Padua, and graduated at the age of 17. In June 1742, the young man received a degree in law, which, according to his memoirs, he was disgusted with. Giacomo was much more interested in other sciences: chemistry, mathematics and medicine.

“It would have been better if I had been allowed to do what I wanted and become a doctor, for whom professional quackery is even more suitable than in legal practice,” he recalled.

Young Casanova

Entry into adulthood: the first sexual experience and the first debts

Despite his dislike of jurisprudence, after studying at the university, Giacomo began working as a lawyer at the church and was accepted as a novice by the Patriarch of Venice himself. At that time, a 76-year-old senator drew attention to the young CasanovaAlviso Gasparo Malipiero. Taking the young man under his wing, he taught him about behavior in the upper strata of society, and also taught him to understand food and wine.

However, their friendship did not last long.

It turned out that Casanova and Malipiero liked the same woman, actress Teresa Ymer. The girl reciprocated the younger gentleman, because of which the senator kicked both of them out of his house. By the way, after that, the romance of Casanova and Ymer immediately stopped. However, the young man did not grieve for a long time. Soon he had his first sexual experience with two sisters, Nanette and Maria Savoryan, aged 14 and 16. After the incident, Casanova finally decided on his vocation in life - he became a ladies' man. The young man's love for women and cards later ruined his religious career, and for the first time he went to prison for debts.

The lawyer was replaced by a soldier

After the church lesson for Giacomo abruptly ended, the man decided to find another calling for himself. In August 1744, Casanova bought a patent for an officer of the Republic of Venice. Entering a new position, the first thing he took care of his appearance:

Realizing that now I was unlikely to succeed in the field of the church, I decided to try on the clothes of a soldier ... I requested a good tailor ... he brought me everything I needed to become an incarnated follower of Mars ... My uniform was white, with a blue front and silver and gold epaulettes. I bought a long saber and, with my elegant cane in hand, in a smart hat with a black cockade, sideburns and a false tail, I set out to impress the whole city.

But he did not impress the city. The new role quickly bored Casanova. He began to be drawn to exploits, and by no means military ones. Therefore, in October 1744, he interrupted his service and returned to his native republic.

Further search for yourself

At 21, Giacomo Casanova decided to become a professional player. However, luck was not on his side: in the very first months, he lost all his money left from the sale of an officer position. Stranded, and even with debts, the man was forced to abandon his career as a gambler.

In search of work, the failed player turned to his old benefactor Alviso Grimani for help. He did not refuse Casanova and helped him get a job as a violinist at the San Samuel Theater. However, a man spoiled by life and this work soon became not to his liking.

“My occupation was not noble, but I did not care. Calling everything prejudice, I soon acquired all the habits of my degraded fellow musicians. We often spent the nights rioting in different quarters of the city, inventing the most scandalous pranks and performing them, having fun untying the gondolas moored at private houses, which were then carried away by the current, ”Cazanova recalled.

Everything was decided by chance.

Returning from the wedding ball, the musician, dissatisfied with his fate, sat in the same gondola with the Venetian senator Giovanni di Matteo Bragadin. On the way, the official had a stroke, and Casanova immediately bled him. In the palace, the doctor repeated the procedure and applied mercury ointment to the patient's chest (at that time, mercury, despite its toxic properties, was considered a universal medicine). As a result, Bragadin became even worse, and he began to choke due to a swollen trachea. Relatives have already called for a priest who would forgive the sins of the dying. But then Casanova intervened, who possessed medical knowledge. He ordered the doctor to remove the ointment from the senator's chest and wash it with cold water. Soon the official recovered from his illness and adopted Casanova, providing him with a decent life.

“I have adopted the most meritorious, noble and only natural way of life. I decided to put myself in a position where I wouldn't have to deprive myself of my essentials. And no one could judge better than me what exactly I needed, ”Casanova wrote in his memoirs.

Prison

Piombi Prison

After saving the senator, Casanova, who did not know the need for anything, went on the Grand Tour. He visited many cities in Europe. Most of all he, of course, liked Paris. He lived in France for 2 years. All this time, Giacomo was actively engaged in creativity and wrote a lot of comedy plays, including Thessaly Women, or Harlequin at the Sabbath and Moluckeida.

Returning to Venice, Casanova incurred the wrath of the Inquisition and was arrested. The man was placed in the Pyombi prison for political offenders. After 5 months of captivity, Giacomo made a desperate attempt to escape, but was caught. The second attempt was successful, and Casanova went to live in Paris.

“So the Lord prepared for me everything I needed to escape, which should have been, if not a miracle, then an event worthy of surprise. I confess I'm proud to have run; but my pride comes not from the fact that I managed to do this - there is a lot of luck here, but because I found it feasible and had the courage to bring my plan to fruition, ”said Casanova.

Further fate

Once in France, Giacomo declared himself an alchemist and gained unprecedented popularity among the most prominent figures of the time, including the Marquise de Pompadour, the Count of Saint-Germain, d'Alembert and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In this way, he became a member of the high society, earned a lot of money and started new novels.

However, fate was not kind to Casanova for long.

Soon, the incorrigible gambler again got into debt, for which he was again arrested. Thanks to the Marquise d'Urfe, 4 days later, he was released. Wanting to get away from trouble, he decided to leave. For several years, Casanova traveled: he visited Holland, Cologne, Switzerland, Marseille, Genoa, Florence, Rome, Naples, Modena, Turin, England, Belgium, and even Moscow and St. Petersburg. All this time his life was full of adventures and troubles. By the way, in 1766, after a duel with pistols with Colonel Count Branitsky, Casanova was expelled from Warsaw, in 1767 he was forced to leave Vienna for cheating, and in 1768 in Barcelona he was almost killed. In 1771, after several years of wandering, Giacomo decided to return to his homeland. To obtain permission and favor from the Venetian authorities, he engaged in commercial espionage. A few months later, Casanova received the long-awaited entry permit and, with tears in his eyes, read:

“We state inquisitors, for reasons known to us, give Giacomo Casanova freedom, giving him the right to come, leave, stop and return, have contacts wherever he pleases without permission and interference. This is our will,” the letter said.

In September 1774, after 18 years of exile, Casanova finally returned to Venice. The Stranger was cordially received at home: at first he was famous and well-known. But soon all this stopped and the world's most famous minion of fate had to get a job with a small salary. Poverty soon broke Casanova. He began to write bilious satire directed against Bohemia, for whichin January 1783 he was again expelled from Venice.

Forced to resume his wanderings, Casanova returned to France. After living in Paris for several months, he left for the Czech Republic, where he got a job as a caretaker of the library of Count Joseph Karl von Waldstein in the Duchtsovsky Castle.

In the last years of his life, Casanova did a lot of creative work. Shortly before his death, he began to write memoirs, which he called "The Story of My Life." He dreamed that future generations would know and remember him (as we can see, his dream came true). Giacomo Casanova died on June 4, 1798 in the Czech Republic, at the age of 73. People close to him recalled that his last words were: "I lived as a philosopher and I die a Christian."

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