Marginalia On Casanova

A philosopher in the guise of a rake. In this wild, dazzling work of literary reinvention, Hungarian modernist Miklós Szentkuthy uses Casanova’s memoirs as a springboard for something far stranger: a swirling meditation on eros, memory, disguise, vanity, and the metaphysics of seduction.

Blending fiction, philosophy, and improvisation, Marginalia on Casanova is less a commentary than an ecstatic interruption—part reverie, part performance, part private theatre of ideas. Szentkuthy’s prose is...