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WORK TITLE: Casanova’s Secret Wife
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://barbaralynndavis.com/
CITY: Boston
STATE: MA
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com/author.aspx/31820 * https://www.wellesley.edu/art/faculty/lynndavis
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1964.
EDUCATION:Brown University, B.A.; Williams College, M.A.; Princeton University, Ph.D.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Art historian, educator, and writer. Worked at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum, Venice Italy; Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA, lecturer in art.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Barbara Lynn-Davis is an art historian whose research focuses on the city of Venice, from the Renaissance period to the eighteenth-century. After receiving her undergraduate degree in art history, Lynn-Davis worked in Venice at the Peggy Guggenheim collection. Her time in the city led Lynn-Davis to develop a lifelong interest in the city, especially how Venetians, who lived in an unusual environment on water, related to the natural world in terms of how they experienced it and represented it. In an interview for the Seductivevenice website, Lynn-Davis noted her time in Venice as an intern she lived with an elderly Yugoslavian countess who took in boarders and gave Lynn-Davis a “the most beautiful bedroom, the big one overlooking the water.” Lynn-Davis went on to note in the interview: “Watching the shining blue-green lagoon each day, the gondolas and fishing boats and occasional ocean liner, that soft Italian light floating in the windows and onto the Oriental carpets and pastel-painted furniture … I fell in love for a lifetime.”
Lynn-Davis’s infatuation with Venice led her not only to focus her academic career as an art historian on the city but also to write a novel that takes place in Venice. Her debut novel, Casanova’s Secret Wife, is based on an actual account written by Giacomo Casanova in which the eighteenth-century Italian adventurer, author, and legendary seducer recounts his love for a fourteen-year-old girl, whom he ultimately married secretly and subsequently abandoned. In Casanova’s Secret Wife, Caterina Capreta is only fourteen when she garners the attention of Giacomo Casanova. The two end up secretly getting married. However, Casanova eventually betrays her, leading Caterina to commit a notorious act that would sully her reputation forever. “Caterina Capreta was a real person in Venice,” Lynn-Davis noted in an interview for the Let Them Read Books website, adding: “But he was not notorious or even well-known at the time my story takes place. I challenge my readers to think apart from Casanova-as-myth and she as just another ‘conquest.’ Theirs is a story of passion, hope, desperation, loss, and enduring love. These are the reasons I wrote the book: to share their haunting love story.”
The novel takes place twenty years after Caterina was brought to the convent on the island of Murano. Caterina is asked by Abbess Marina Morosini to provide a place for a pregnant, unwed 16-year-old whose father dropped off at the convent. Catarina agrees, sympathizing with the young girl named Leda from a nobel family because Leda shares the same secret as Catarina when she was left the convent so many years earlier. As the story progresses, readers learn about the details of Caterina’s past via flashbacks. Like the young Leda that Caterina agreed to take in, Caterina was left at the convent by her own father, who was trying to prevent the young Caterina from seeing Casanova. At the time the abbess was a just a young nun who Caterina believes is her friend. However, the two women’s relationship turns out to be much more complicated and includes a betrayal. Caterina reveals the secrets of her past to Leda, who learns of Caterina’s passionate affair with Casanova, Marina’s betrayal, and most importantly Casanova’s abandonment of his young wife.
“By bringing little known history to life, Lynn-Davis delivers an unforgettable love story,” wrote Kathe Robin in a review for RT Book Reviews Online, also calling Casanova’s Secret Wife “a richly woven tapestry of Casanova’s early life.” A Publishers Weekly contributor praised how Lynn-Davis incorporated “historical detail into this page-turning drama of mystery, love, and loss,” and went on to especially note Lynn-Davis’s portrait of Casanova as a “character who stands apart from the legend.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, June 26, 2017, review of Casanova’s Secret Wife, p. 149.
ONLINE
Barbara Lynn-Davis Website, http://barbaralynndavis.com (April 17, 2018).
Historical Novel Society Website, https://historicalnovelsociety.org/ (March 24, 2018), review of Casanova’s Secret Wife.
Let Them Read Books, http://schlagergroup.net/ (August 3, 2017), “Blog Tour Q&A with Barbara Lynn-Davis, Author of Casanova’s Secret Wife.”
RT Book Reviews, https://www.rtbookreviews.com/ (March 24, 2018), Kathe Robin, review of Casanova’s Secret Wife.
Seductivevenice, https://seductivevenice.wordpress.com/ (August 24, 2017), “Venice, My Muse: An Interview with Barbara Lynn-Davis.
Wellesley College Website, https://www.wellesley.edu/ (April 17, 2018), author faculty profile.
Barbara Lynn-Davis
Lecturer in Art
Research focuses on the city of Venice, Renaissance to the eighteenth-century.
After graduating from college with a degree in art history, I worked at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice and embarked on a life-long love affair with the lagoon city. In particular, I am interested in the ways that Venetians—given their singular environment built on water—experienced, represented, and imagined the natural world. Asking this question about Venice and other historic cultures deepens my understanding of our own relationship to nature. Related to this theme, one of the combined art history/writing courses I teach is Gods and Groves: History of Gardens and Landscape Architecture. I also teach the writing sections of the department’s introduction to the history and analysis of art.
I am the author of a novel set in eighteenth-century Venice, Casanova’s Secret Wife (Kensington Press, 2017). The story is based on an account by Giacomo Casanova of a fourteen year-old girl whom he passionately loved, married in a secret ceremony -- and ruined. I am currently at work on Searching for Raphael, a novel based on the true story of a self-portrait by the Renaissance artist that was stolen by the Nazis, and never found. It is widely considered the most important art loss from WWII.
At Wellesley, I have been able to unite these two intellectual threads—art, and writing—to bring out the best in students’ ideas. I am proud that my past students have been recipients of the Kathryn Wasserman Davis ’28 Art Prize, as well as the Three Generations Prize for First-Year Writing.
Barbara Lynn-Davis
ABOUT:
Barbara Lynn-Davis graduated from Brown University with a degree in art history. She then worked at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum in Venice and later spent a year there while completing her Ph.D. in Renaissance art at Princeton University. She currently teaches art history and writing at Wellesley College, and lives outside Boston with her family.
BIO
After graduating from Brown University with a degree in art history, Barbara Lynn-Davis worked at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum in Venice and began a life-long love affair with the lagoon city. She returned to Venice for a year while completing her Ph.D. in Renaissance art at Princeton University. Along the way, she discovered the memoirs of famed lover Giacomo Casanova, and found the story she wanted to tell. Lynn-Davis teaches art history and writing at Wellesley College, and lives outside Boston with her family.
Venice, My Muse: An Interview with Barbara Lynn-Davis
Posted on August 24, 2017
by seductivevenice
Welcome to a new series I’m beginning today. Since I’ve been getting to know more and more of my readers, I thought it’d be fun to create a set of interview questions to highlight their love for Venice. I’m titling this “Venice, My Muse” to honor the many ways that Venice inspires our community of Venetophiles. Watch out–you might be next!
My first interview is with Barbara Lynn-Davis, who you may remember as the author of Casanova’s Secret Wife, which I reviewed a few weeks ago. Barbara earned an art history degree from Brown University and went on to complete a Ph.D. in Renaissance art at Princeton. She currently teaches art history and writing at Wellesley and makes time to write novels as well. Here are her responses to my questions:
How has Venice seduced you?
I first became enchanted with Venice while working as an intern after college at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection. I lived with an 86 year-old Yugoslavian countess (she always proudly insisted I call her “contessa”.) She owned a fairly modest, 2-bedroom apartment overlooking the Giudecca Canal. Because she was monetizing her apartment by taking in students, she gave me the most beautiful bedroom, the big one overlooking the water. Watching the shining blue-green lagoon each day, the gondolas and fishing boats and occasional ocean liner, that soft Italian light floating in the windows and onto the Oriental carpets and pastel-painted furniture … I fell in love for a lifetime.
What do you never fail to do in Venice?
I love Venice in the dark especially, when the day has been screaming hot and night is a balm. I never fail to stop and inhale the perfume of jasmine climbing through garden gates. I close my eyes and imagine what it would be like to be inside such an enclosed and treasured place, as to have a garden in Venice is the ultimate luxury.
Walk or take a boat?
Walk, mostly. But when I was living there working on my dissertation, I also loved the convenience of popping into a gondola traghetto that went from Piazza San Marco to the Church of the Salute. It cost next-to-nothing and was a way to experience a (bumpy) gondola ride that otherwise I could never have afforded!
Which church or campo best epitomizes you? Please explain.
Love this question! For me, it’s definitely Campiello Barbaro in Dorsoduro. To me, it is perfect: its intimate size, the canal that runs along one side, and most of all, the view of the back of Ca’ Dario, where a fifteenth century open-air loggia overlooks a high-walled pocket garden. I adore this campo so much that in my book, I imagined my main character, Caterina Capreta, living in this perfect spot.
What do you always tell friends to do when they visit the city?
I always tell my friends to see the painting by Vittor Carpaccio of St. George and the Dragon in the Scuola di San Giorgio deli Schiavoni. A scuola was a confraternity dedicated to the civic good, and many of the more than one-hundred confraternities in Venice were also patrons of the arts. This painting depicts St. George fighting for the life of a frightened princess in Libya. Carpaccio had never traveled to such an exotic place, and instead, he conjured the scene through his imagination and resourcefulness: for example, to portray the large gateway visible on the shoreline he used a woodblock print (prints circulated widely in Venice at this time) of an actual gate in Cairo. In the end, to see this glowing painting still on the walls of the confraternity is to feel eerily, magically transported back in time.
If you could have dinner with any Venetian, living or dead, who would it be and why? What would dinner be?
With Casanova, naturalmente! I would want to share the meal he tells us he savored with lover Marina Morosini in his casino: game, fish, truffles, oysters, fruit, sorbet and Burgundy wines. I would also settle for a big bowl of macaroni and cheese, which I know he also enjoyed 🙂
Casanova: genius or cad?
In my view he is clever, funny, a risk-taker, adventurous, and seductive. Not afraid to say it: I adore him.
What would you do with $30,000 U.S. to spend in Venice?
I’ve done a lot of research on Murano as once an island of convents, villas and gardens. That is, it was Venice’s green space (to use a modern term.) But a visitor today to Murano does not get this feel at all. I dream of somehow recovering this sense of an island devoted to the pleasures of nature, whether restoring a single building and garden or maybe even designing a new green space for people to enjoy and reflect in.
If money were no object, which palazzo would you buy?
I think I would buy Ca’ Dario, but there’s a superstition that it is the “house that kills” so that’s a bit of a dampener on my enthusiasm.
Would you rather be a courtesan or a noblewoman? Make your case.
I would much rather be a noblewoman. Noblewomen, at least in the eighteenth-century, had quite a lot of freedom. For example, they enjoyed the company of cicisbei, basically boy toys whose role it was to make a woman feel beautiful and accompany her out in society. Sometimes these cicisbei were also lovers, sometimes not. Readers will note that in my book, the social life of Caterina Capreta is very circumscribed, but she is a merchant’s daughter, belonging to the more traditional cittadino class. Noblewomen had it much better (as usual.)
What is your favorite cicchetti? Do you have a cicchetti story?
My favorite Venetian snack are tramezzini (English-style tea sandwiches.) I include a recipe for them on my website, below. I made them recently for my writers’ group and they were a huge hit. Even if you think you don’t like mayonnaise and white bread, you will likely discover that when combined with these savory Italian fillings, you do!
Which gelato flavor are you?
Bacio, for sure 🙂
How can readers learn more about you and your creative pursuits?
Visit my website, www.barbaralynndavis.com for a multisensory experience of Venice: an excerpt from my book, plus art, music, food and drink, and an invitation to “walk with Casanova” in the company of Kathleen’s marvelous guidebook, Seductive Venice: In Casanova’s Footsteps.
And a final note:
In order to encourage more engagement with my blog, I’m also offering a raffle! If you “like” this post on WordPress or Facebook and also leave a comment, your name will be entered into a raffle to win a copy of Barbara’s book Casanova’s Secret Wife. Deadline: August 31 at midnight Pacific time.
Thursday, August 3, 2017
Blog Tour Q&A with Barbara Lynn-Davis, Author of Casanova's Secret Wife
Please join me in welcoming Barbara Lynn-Davis to Let Them Read Books! Barbara is touring the blogosphere with her debut historical novel, Casanova's Secret Wife, and I recently had the chance to ask her a few burning questions about her famous subject and his not-so-famous wife. Read on and enter to win a paperback copy of Casanova's Secret Wife!
Set in eighteenth-century Venice and based on an actual account by Giacomo Casanova—here is a lush tale of desire and risk.
Caterina Capreta was an innocent girl of fourteen when she caught the attention of the world’s most infamous chronicler of seduction: Giacomo Casanova. Intoxicated by a fierce love, she wed Casanova in secret. But his shocking betrayal inspired her to commit an act that would mark her forever …
Now twenty years later on the island of Murano, the woman in possession of Caterina’s most devastating secret has appeared with a request she cannot refuse: to take in a noble-born girl whose scandalous love affair resembles her own. But the girl’s presence stirs up unwelcome memories of Caterina’s turbulent past. Tested like never before, she reveals the story of the man she will never forget.
Bringing to life a fascinating chapter in the history of Venice, Casanova’s Secret Wife is a tour de force that charts one woman’s journey through love and loss to redemption.
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Hi Barbara! Welcome to Let Them Read Books! Thanks so much for taking the time to join us today.
Can you tell us what inspired you to write a story about Casanova from the point of view of one of his conquests? Was Caterina a real historical figure?
Caterina Capreta was a real person in Venice, only fourteen years old when she met Giacomo Casanova. But he was not notorious or even well-known at the time my story takes place. I challenge my readers to think apart from Casanova-as-myth and she as just another “conquest.” Theirs is a story of passion, hope, desperation, loss, and enduring love. These are the reasons I wrote the book: to share their haunting love story.
What kind of research did you do to prepare for this story? Did you come across anything that surprised you?
Readers often remark on the setting: the inimitable city of Venice. I first became enchanted with Venice while working at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in the neighborhood of Dorsoduro. Later, as a graduate student, I returned to live in Venice and got to know the city inside and out. I can walk the streets, dart in and out of churches to find hidden altarpieces, smell the night jasmine creeping out of garden gates, and hear the lapping water in my mind. I did do “book” research for the story, like about midwife practice, horse care, and the Jewish ghetto. But mostly, the story is an unpouring of images and memories I carry inside of me.
Which scene in the novel was the most fun to write? Were there any aspects that were more difficult for you?
Oh! No question there. After I’d finished (or thought I’d finished) the book, my agent said, “I want MORE CASANOVA.” The story is told from a woman’s point of view, but she wanted to understand his motivations, his humanity more. This prompted me to reread the memoirs and really think about him again. I felt I was able to dig so much deeper and wrote my favorite scene, when Caterina and Casanova go on a walk together in the night, and he tells her about his past.
My favorite part about writing is when characters just start “doing” things you didn’t anticipate: in this scene, following his confession, Casanova kisses Caterina against a church wall … I didn’t plan it, it just happened :)
(This chapter is excerpted on Passages to the Past.)
And lastly--because inquiring minds want to know--if you had been a contemporary of Casanova, do you think he could have seduced you?
OMG I’m so excited you asked me this question because I’ve asked myself this many times! Experiencing his life through his memoirs, I find him clever, amusing, adventurous, a risk-taker, and of course, seductive. Reader, I fell in love with him.
Short answer: yup.
About the Author:
Barbara Lynn-Davis graduated from Brown University with a degree in art history. She then worked at the Peggy Guggenheim Museum in Venice and later spent a year there while completing her PhD in Renaissance art at Princeton University.
She currently teaches art history and writing at Wellesley College and lives outside Boston with her family.
For more information, please visit Barbara Lynn-Davis’s website. You can also connect with her on Facebook and Goodreads.
Casanova's Secret Wife
Publishers Weekly. 264.26 (June 26, 2017): p149.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Casanova's Secret Wife
Barbara Lynn-Davis. Kensington, $16 trade paper (346p) ISBN 978-1-4967-1231-8
Lynn-Davis's debut novel is based on the real-life story of Giacomo Casanova, who fell in love with and secretly married a 14-year-old in 18th-century Venice. Twenty years after their initial meeting, Abbess Marina Morosini asks Caterina Capreta to take in Leda, a pregnant unwed 16-year-old who was dropped off at the convent by her father. Caterina feels obligated to agree because of the secret she and Marina share from when Caterina was sent to the convent years ago, a secret that is revealed in flashbacks as Caterina shares her past with Leda. Caterina chronicles her past love affair with Casanova, with whom she falls in love when she is only 14. To keep them from seeing each other, Caterina's father sends her to a convent. There she meets Marina, a young nun who initially appears to be her friend. Yet as Caterina tells her tale, it becomes clear that it is one of jealousy and deception. Lynn-Davis admirably incorporates historical detail into this page-turning drama of mystery, love, and loss. Yet the standout is her depiction of Casanova--Lynn-Davis clearly enjoys crafting a real-life character who stands apart from the legend, making him the book's most enduring character. (Aug.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Casanova's Secret Wife." Publishers Weekly, 26 June 2017, p. 149. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A497444207/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=4455c898. Accessed 24 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A497444207
Casanova’s Secret Wife
BY BARBARA LYNN-DAVIS
Find & buy on
Barbara Lynn-Davis’ debut novel is a delicious delight, a feast for the senses. Setting her work in romantic Venice, and basing it on Casanova’s actual writings, Lynn-Davis tells the story of Caterina Capreta, an innocent girl of fourteen who is swept off her feet by the charming and handsome Giacomo Casanova. She gives up her virtue rather easily, but then, it is Casanova—how could she resist? However, echoing the themes in Romeo and Juliet, Caterina’s father intervenes in the love affair and sends Caterina to a convent. It is here that Caterina is truly corrupted.
The story is told through a series of flashbacks as the older, wiser Caterina reveals her story to Leda, the high-born young girl brought to her by the nun who knows all of Caterina’s darkest secrets. Slowly, Caterina shares her story, and a mother/daughter relationship develops between the older and younger woman.
Well-written and seductive, this book will draw the reader in. Some readers might even stay up until the wee hours to learn what becomes of Caterina and Casanova, surely one of the most passionate love stories of all time. An excellent romp!
CASANOVA’S SECRET WIFE
Image of Casanova's Secret Wife
Author(s): Barbara Lynn-Davis
Lynn-Davis debuts with a fascinating story based on the notorious lover Giacomo Casanova’s writings. With Venice as the romantic backdrop and young love as its focus, this stunning tale of passion, betrayal and redemption is a richly woven tapestry of Casanova’s early life. By bringing little known history to life, Lynn-Davis delivers an unforgettable love story, centering not only on Casanova, but two women who share the beauty of love and the pain of loss; one will find salvation and the other true happiness.
It has been 22 years since Caterina Capreta fell in love and married Giacomo Casanova. She had been an innocent, love-struck 14-year-old when she was willingly seduced by him. Now she is called back to the one place she hoped never to see again: the convent on Murano where she spent the years after her marriage, and where one woman holds the key to her past — her frenemy Marina. Caterina cannot refuse Marina’s request to bring a pregnant girl into her home. Leda reminds Caterina of everything she longs to forget, yet as she relates her story to Leda, Caterina begins to view her life differently. She recalls the great passion and lust she shared with Casanova, her family’s disappointment, her greatest loss, Marina’s betrayal, and finally Casanova’s abandonment. It is through helping Leda find her happiness that Caterina can look back at her past and move on into her own future. (KENSINGTON, Jul., 346 pp., $16.00)
Reviewed by:
Kathe Robin