Lover, Liar, Librettist, Librarian:
Don Giovanni, Don Juan, Da Ponte, and Casanova

There are many characters involved in the story of Don Giovanni, both real and fictional, whose lives share some interesting parallels:

Librettist – Da Ponte: Revived the legend of Don Juan in the libretto for Mozart’s Don Giovanni

Lover & Liar – Don Juan: Don Juan is a legendary figure who almost definitely never lived.  The first written version of his story was probably El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra (“The Scoundrel of Seville and the Stone Guest”) published in Spain in 1630 and attributed to Tirso de Molina (pseudonym of Gabriel Téllez).

Lover, Librarian, and assistant to a Librettist – Casanova: Casanova may have helped his friend Da Ponte with some last-minute details about the life of a prolific lover, and he probably attended the premiere. Casanova’s papers include a sketch in his handwriting for Leporello’s recitative and aria after the second-act sextet.  Coincidentally, Casanova had a clever servant/sidekick:  his Leporello-equivalent was named Gioachino Costa. Casanova’s last job was as a librarian for Count Josef Karl Emmanuel von Waldstein.  However, he spent his time in the library writing his own works and translating the Iliad and Odyssey into Italian.

How many tellings of the Don Juan legend have been written?
Good question.  Scholars agree on at least 600, and some say as many as 3,000.  Most agree that the most important and influential is the Mozart-Da Ponte opera.  Other literary Don Juans include:

• 1665:  Molière, Dom Juan, ou le festin de Pierre (“Don Juan, or the Stone Feast,” comedy)
  
  
• 1675:  Thomas Shadwell, The Libertine (also called The Libertine Destroy’d); music by Henry Purcell included “Nymphs and shepherds, come away” and “In these delightful, pleasant groves”
  
  
• 1813:  E. T. A. Hoffmann, Don Juan (novella)
  
  
• 1830: Pushkin, Каменный гость (Kamenny Gost, “The Stone Guest,” play)
  
  
• 1834: Prosper Mérimée (author of Carmen!), Les âmes du Purgatoire (“Souls in Purgatory,” short story)
  
  
• 1819-24:  Lord Byron, Don Juan (satiric poem that rhymes “Juan” with “ruin” and “new one;” see our resource list for a link to the poem)
  
  
• 1844:  José Zorrilla,  Don Juan Tenorio (still the most performed Don Juan play in Spain and Latin America; see our resources section for a link to the complete play in Spanish and English)
  
  
• 1903:  George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman (drama)

What are the essential plot elements of a Don Juan story?

• Don Juan “seduces” a noble family’s daughter, who may mistake him for her fiancé; she screams for help, her father rushes to her rescue, and Don Juan kills the father.
• Don Juan accepts a dinner invitation from a statue of the father, resulting in Don Juan’s death.
• Typical episodes within the story include crashing a country wedding, being rediscovered by abandoned victims, being rescued by a peasant girl after a shipwreck, and being hunted by a small gang of his victims and their defenders.  Juan’s method typically involves pretending to be the victim’s beloved in the dark or in disguise, or promising marriage.
• The sidekick character (Leporello in the opera) dates back to Molina’s play, where he is named Catalinón.

Which of those elements appear in dictionary definitions of “Don Juan”?
The seducer/libertine aspect, sometimes a suave irresponsibility as well.  No avenging statue.

Was Casanova a legend?
Legendary, yes, but a real person:  Giovanni Giacomo Casanova (1725-1798) renamed himself Jean-Jacques, Chevalier de Seingalt in 1760 to escape creditors.  After an adventurous life that included working for a cardinal, playing the violin in Venice, helping found the French lottery in Paris, serving prison time in Venice for being a magician (escaping after one year of his five-year sentence), getting expelled from Florence, and spending time in Rome, London, Germany, Switzerland, Savoy, Riga, St. Petersburg, Warsaw, and Madrid, he settled in Bohemia in 1785, serving Count von Waldstein as librarian at his chateau.  His doctor assigned him to write as therapy, and he produced twelve volumes of memoirs, first published 30 years after his death:  Mémoires de J. Casanova de Seingalt, reissued definitively in 1960-62 as Histoire de ma vie (“Story of my Life”).  His memoirs established his reputation as a seducer.

Who had the biggest little black book?
Giovanni, by far, according to Leporello’s “catalog aria” about him:

Casanova lists 122 in his memoir.  Casanova, however, actually loved or at least liked virtually all of his women.  He wrote:  "Real love is the love that sometimes arises after sensual pleasure: if it does, it is immortal; the other kind inevitably goes stale, for it lies in mere fantasy."

Why don’t Casanova’s memoirs mention Don Giovanni?
Casanova’s memoirs stop at 1774.  He met Da Ponte in 1777, and they remained friends for 20 years.  He met Mozart in 1787.

What else do we know about Da Ponte?
A lot.  Here are a six intriguing facts about the man who wrote the librettos for Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte:

1. He was born Emmanuele Conegliano, and renamed for Lorenzo Da Ponte, the bishop of Ceneda who welcomed his family to the Catholic Church when they converted from Judaism.
2. As a young man, he was admired for his ability to improvise verse—like a rapper!
3. He was allegedly arrogant.  The Irish tenor Michael Kelly, for whom he and Mozart wrote the roles of Don Basilio and Don Curzio in Le nozze di Figaro, said that he thrust his chest out so far that he needed a cane behind him to keep from falling.
4. He wrote a memoir—the story of his life as he wanted it remembered.  Scholars have tried to puzzle out the truth for several decades.  He did have a rather wild series of mistresses, including one who threatened him with a stiletto.
5. Fleeing creditors, he immigrated to America in 1805, where his attempts to support himself in New York and Pennsylvania included a bookstore, a grocery store, medicine and dry goods shops, and a distillery.
6. He was the first person to teach Italian at an American university, namely Columbia.  A major influence in importing Italian culture to America, he led a campaign that created America’s first purpose-built opera theatre, the Italian Opera House, opened in 1833 on the corner of Church and Leonard Streets.

Where can we learn more about Da Ponte?

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