World libraries: Unique acquisition of France’s National Library

The France’s National Library (Bibliothèque Nationale de France (BNF)) has spent 7 million euro for the manuscript of the famous lothario Giacomo Girolamo Casanova, which for almost 200 years had been kept by German publishers. 

The manuscript, containing 3,700 pages of memoirs, with its key part entitled “The Story of My Life” (“Histoire de Ma Vie”) was started by Casanova in 1789.

On his deathbed, Giacomo Casanova bequeathed memoires to his nephew, whose children in 1821 sold them to the German publishing house Brockhaus. In 1823 access to the original was closed.

In 1943 the Nazis ordered the closure of the Brockhaus publishing house in Leipzig, and its owner put the manuscript in a safe at the bank. Memoirs managed to survive bombing and in 1945 the US troops sent them to Wiesbaden.

The heir of the publishing house, Hubertus Brockhaus, decided to sell manuscript to the France’s National Library and got in touch with a France’s Ambassador to Berlin. Negotiations continued for about 3 years.  The manuscript, which might have come under the hammer for 20 million euro, was sold to the library almost 3 times as cheap. The sum for purchasing the manuscript was provided by an anonymous sponsor.

The Librarian of the France’s National Library, Bruno Racine, said that that was the most significant purchase the BNF had ever made in terms of monetary value. He emphasized that Casanova’s memoirs had become universally known but they had been censored and closed for public. According to the Minister of Culture of France, François Mitterrand, the originals had fell victim to 500 alterations by editors and it was not until 1960 that a full version was printed in French.   

This manuscript will be available at an exhibition, which will be launched at the library in autumn 2011.