History of My Life: v.3 & 4

“Trask has written a version in an English fully contemporary yet remarkably Italian in sensibility. With admirable restraint and refinement, he has conveyed the zest and sensuous delight of the original.”—‘National Book Award Citation’ Volumes 3 and 4 offer some of the most extraordinary episodes in Casanova’s extraordinary life, including his liaison with the nun M. M., and his flight from the State Inquisitor’s prison—each in its own way a feat of singular dash and daring.

Author Biography

Giacomo Casanova was born in Venice in 1725. His parents, both actors, wanted him to become a priest, but their hopes were dashed when, at sixteen, he was expelled from seminary for immoral misconduct. Probably best-known for his reputation as a womanizer, Casanova was in turn a secretary, a soldier in the Venetian army, a preacher, an alchemist, a gambler, a violinist, a lottery director, and a spy. He translated Homer’s Iliad into Italian and collaborated with Da Ponte on the libretto for Mozart’s Don Giovanni. He retired in 1785 to the castle of a friend-Count Waldstein of Bohemia-in order to write his memoirs.