Casanova - Mémoires écrits par lui-même - 1871

Jacques Casanova de Seingalt. Memoirs written by himself.

Complete work in six volumes.

Brussels, J. Rozez bookseller-editor. 1871. Octavo. 508, 526, 508, 522, 474, and 476 pages. Red half-cloth bindings with blue title and volume numbers on a smooth spine.

"Original edition, the only complete one" published from the text established by publicist Philippe Busoni in six volumes with uniform bindings. Works in excellent condition, marginal foxing.

Giacomo Girolamo Casanova is successively a violinist, writer, magician (for the sole purpose of deceiving Madame d'Urfé), spy, diplomat, then librarian, but always claims his status as a "Venetian." He uses many pseudonyms, the most frequent being the chevalier de Seingalt; he publishes in French under the name "Jacques Casanova de Seingalt."

The name of this adventurer has become synonymous with a "seducer" of women, and by all means, even dishonest ones. Histoire de ma vie, written in French and regarded as one of the most authentic sources concerning customs and etiquette then in use in Europe in the 18th century, mentions one hundred forty-two women with whom he would have had sexual relations, including girls barely of age and his own daughter, then married to one of his “brothers,” with whom he would have had the only son he knew, if one believes his testimony.

L’Histoire de ma vie is considered a monument of literature, both for its style, its erotic content (curiosa), and as a particularly rich testimony on 18th‑century society: Blaise Cendrars "considers Casanova’s Memoirs the true Encyclopaedia of the 18th century," and Francis Lacassin sees in it "... a work that in the century of Louis XV is to what Saint-Simon’s Mémoires is to the century of Louis XIV."

A fine set, in uniform binding, of this Belgian edition, known as the "Rozez" edition.