Leo Damrosch *68 is a Harvard professor of literature, emeritus, who has written biographies of Jonathan Swift, William Blake, and others. In his new book, titled Adventurer, he tackles Giacomo Casanova — the real Casanova, separate from the many fictionalized accounts that his name has inspired over the centuries, and separate from the version he painted of himself in a massive autobiography toward the end of his life. Damrosch spoke with PAW about untangling Casanova’s story and about how the modern biographer should treat a legendary womanizer, spy, con man, diplomat, gambler, novelist, and philosopher more than 200 years after he lived.
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