James Newhouse - A Real Don Juan

I have to admit, I know bugger-all about Giacomo Casanova. Except that his name translates into English as James Newhouse (don't names always sounds better in Romance languages? Mine would be Tommaso Guerriero).

My good mate Sam (Samuele Rubinetti) asked me if I could address the myth of Mr Casanova. Was he, as history would have us believe, a 'man-whore'?

Because that is certainly what he is famous for. Whether you know the intricacies of his life or not, chances are that, when you hear that name, you think of a guy who has slept around a lot. A bit like Don Juan (or Don Giovanni, in Italian). The difference is, Don Juan was fictional. But Casanova was the real thing.

Jimmy Newhouse led a pretty darned exciting life. Born in Venice in 1725, he spent 73 fun-packed years carousing around Europe, hatching schemes, sleeping with women, educating himself, being arrested, gambling away his fortune, and generally not focusing on any one thing for too long. Reading about his exploits, one thinks immediately of an 18th-century Cosmo Kramer - constantly flitting from project to project, from lover to lover, having a grand old time, and always landing on his feet.

But was he a 'man-whore'?

In his memoirs, he mentions 122 sexual encounters with different women (with a few not-so-boastful implied encounters with blokes).

Now, 122 may sound like a lot. But that still only averages out to two a year, from when he was first fondled by a female friend at age 11. And there are plenty of other, more contemporary figures, who have probably had as many, if not more: Mick Jagger and Warren Beatty jump to mind, as well as basketballer Wilt Chamberlain, who claimed he'd slept with 20,000 ladies. Wow.

But it's not just about the quantity. In his lengthy discussions of his seduction technique, he states the importance of love being one-on-one (no orgies for our Venetian friend); of the value of attentiveness and conversation; that alcohol and violence are not tools to be employed by the truly great lover; and that the greatest conquests were those preceded by some sort of chase (one night stands would not have been his favourites).

So, it seems that Cassie slept with a very large number of women, but treated each as a sexually/emotionally/intellectually-fulfilling relationship, to be savoured over a quite lengthy period of time. Unlike the conventional image of a man-whore, which would look more like Keith Richards, pepped up on goofballs, shagging fourteen underaged groupies in a Miami hotel, whilst wearing a leather g-string and 10-inch dildo, and simultaneously snorting coke off a dwarf's thigh.

The other thing to remember is that the main source for our information on Casanova's wondrous sexploits is his very own, 12-volume autobiography - The History of My Life. Running to 3500 pages in its unexpurgated form, the book pretty much recounts every single experience in Giacomo's time on earth.

This isn't selling yourself along the lines of a modern-day cash-in memoir such as Britney: My Life (by Britney Spears and Some Proper Author, 44 pages). This is pure, unadulterated, 12-volume, self-promotion by the multi-talented celebrity of his era. So we can probably take some of what he says with a grain of salt.

He did lots of amazing stuff, and lived a rich and fulfilling life. Along the way he had lots of wholesome sex. The he wrote a big, fat exaggerated account about it.

In fact, if Casanova was anything, he was a self-obsessed celebrity with ADHD, who thought he could do absolutely anything if he put his mind to it, who had an obsession with sex.

Kind of like Madonna.