Just how honest was Casanova in his memoirs? Perhaps, `honest' isn't the word. No doubt, Casanova considered himself honest. But was he factually correct?

     Casanova may be honest in his Memoirs when he tells us that he once had sex with a mistress while his illegitimate daughter watched, but was he being factual? The problem lies in the preciseness of the definition. An honest man can tell you his dreams. Because of his honesty, he considers them real.

     To the honest man, the dreams might as well have happened. If I were to write my Memoirs tomorrow and they did not include my dreams, I would not consider myself very honest. This leads me to believe that Casanova included his dreams in the Memoirs. But did he distinguish them from the factual reality?

"He spoke in a very persuasive manner and 
often impersonated any character he chose.
`My secret is simple:  I always say the truth, 
and people naturally believe me,' he lied in his memoirs.  
His truths were, to say the least improbable and, at times, 
blatantly absurd.  
Yet most people trusted him for a time."
-Luigi Barzini, The Italians


	

     It is this discrepancy between what is honest and what is true that creates Casanova's counter-myth. No doubt started by the same psychologists who formed a complex out of the man's name. According to psychologists, Casanova's personality is explained by closet homosexuality disguising itself by heightening masculinity through romancing women. The more you screw, the more you are man.

     This theory on Casanova is echoed in 1976 by the Italian film director, Federico Fellini. In Fellini's Casanova, Fellini presents Casanova as an extremely effeminate character who mechanizes the process of sex.(See Symptom 4.) The whole way through the film Casanova bucks and pumps like some sort of machine until at last he meets up with his perfect mate, a mechanical woman.

     But this interpretation of Casanova as the lover without love, leaves out one thing. If that was Casanova's only purpose with all of the sexual exploits, then why write all of the love letters?

     After Casanova's death, stacks of love letters were found both to and from him. As it turned out, he had been corresponding with some of these women for over fifty years. That's a hell of a price to deny your sexual orientation.