Journey to Italy

833 Pages·2020·19.629 MB·English

by  Marquis de Sade

JOURNEY TO ITALY
THE LORENZO DA PONTE ITALIAN LIBRARY
General Editors
Luigi Ballerini and Massimo Ciavolella,
University of California at Los Angeles
Associate Editor
Gianluca Rizzo, Colby College
Honorary Chairs
Ambassador Gianfranco Facco Bonetti
Dr Berardo Paradiso
Honorable Anthony J. Scirica
Advisory Board
Lina Bolzoni, Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa
Francesco Bruni, Università di Venezia
Franca D’Agostini, Università di Milano
Giorgio Ficara, Università di Torino
Hermann Haller, City University of New York
Giuseppe Mazzotta, Yale University
Nicoletta Pireddu, Georgetown University
Gilberto Pizzamiglio, Università di Venezia
Margaret Rosenthal, University of Southern California
John Scott, University of Western Australia
Elissa Weaver, University of Chicago
Agincourt Ltd. Board of Trustees
Stefano Albertini
Luigi Ballerini
Giuseppe Brusa
Vivian Cardia
Maria Teresa Cometto
Lorenzo Mannelli
Eugenio Nardelli
Berardo Paradiso
Nicola Tegoni
Anthony Julian Tamburri
THE LORENZO DA PONTE ITALIAN LIBRARY
JOURNEY to ITALY
Donatien Alphonse François,
Marquis de Sade
Translated, introduced, and annotated
by James A. Steintrager
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Toronto Buffalo London
© University of Toronto Press 2020
Toronto Buffalo London
utorontopress.com
Printed in the U.S.A.
ISBN 978-1-4875-0597-4 (cloth)    ISBN 978-1-4875-3306-9 (EPUB)
  ISBN 978-1-4875-3305-2 (PDF)
The Lorenzo Da Ponte Italian Library
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: Journey to Italy / Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade ; 
translated, introduced, and annotated by James A. Steintrager.
Other titles: Voyage d’Italie. English
Names: Sade, Marquis de, 1740–1814, author. | Steintrager, James A., 
writer of added commentary, translator.
Series: Lorenzo Da Ponte Italian library.
Description: Series statement: The Lorenzo Da Ponte Italian library | 
Translation of: Voyage d’Italie. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20190232595 | Canadiana (ebook) 20190232676 | ISBN 
9781487505974 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781487533069 (EPUB) | ISBN 9781487533052 (PDF)
Subjects: LCSH: Sade, Marquis de, 1740–1814 – Travel – Italy. | LCSH: Italy – Social life and 
customs – 18th century. | LCSH: Italy – Description and travel – Early works to 1800. | LCSH: 
Authors, French – 18th century – Biography. | LCSH: Authors, French – Travel – Italy.
Classification: LCC PQ2063.S3 A78513 2020 | DDC 848/.603 – dc23
This volume is published under the aegis of Agincourt Press Ltd. and with the financial assistance of 
Dr. Lorenzo Mannelli, Dr. Berardo Paradiso, and Casa Italiana Zerilli - Marimó of New York University.
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its publishing program of the 
Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council, an agency of the Government of Ontario.
Funded by the Financé par le
Government gouvernement
of Canada du Canada
Oh, God! I said to myself, breathing in air at once purer and freer. Here I am in that part of 
Europe that is so interesting and so sought out by curious minds. Here I am in the country 
of Messalinas and Neros. Tramping on the same soil as these models of crime and debauch-
ery, perhaps I shall be able to imitate simultaneously the infamies of Agrippina’s incestu-
ous son and the lubricious acts of Claudius’s adulterous wife!
– Marquis de Sade, L’Histoire de Juliette (1797)
Nature, more bizarre than moralists paint her for us, at every moment escapes the dikes 
that the policies of the former would like to impose on her; uniform in her plans, irregular 
in her effects, her bosom, ever restless, resembles the hearth of a volcano from which are 
thrown up in turn either precious stones that serve men’s luxury or flaming spheres that 
annihilate them; great when she peoples the earth with the likes of Antoninus and Titus; 
dreadful when she vomits forth the likes of Andronicus and Nero; but always sublime, 
always majestic, always worthy of our study, of our brushes, and of our respectful admira-
tion, because her plans are unknown to us, because slaves to her caprices and to her needs, 
it is never upon that which she makes us experience that we ought to settle our feelings 
for her, but upon her grandeur and upon her energy, whatever the results thereof may be.
– Marquis de Sade, “Idée sur les romans” (1800)
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Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction: A Guide to Sade’s Grand Tour of Italy and the Road to Infamy xiii
Notes on the Text and Translation   cv
JOURNEY TO ITALY
I  Florence and the Start of the Journey from La Coste   3
II  Rome   49
III  [Environs of Rome:] Journey to Frascati, Grottaferrata, Marino, 
Castel Gandolfo, Albano, and Ariccia   164
IV  Naples   187
V  Environs of Naples   260
VI  Route from Rome to Naples or from Naples to Rome   324
DOSSIERS AND CORRESPONDENCE
Dossier I       General Material   381
Dossier II     Florence   429
Dossier III  Rome   484
Correspondence   582
Bibliography 651
Name Index 675
Subject Index 703
Colour plates follow page 276
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Illustrations
Figures
0.1  Satirical print on Chaupy’s Découverte de la maison de
campagne d’Horace  xxiii
0.2  Etruscan figurines in Doctor Mesny’s cabinet of curiosities  xl
0.3  Grotta del Cane and Lago di Agnano  xlii
0.4  Grotta del Cane  xlii
0.5  Temple at Paestum  lxi
0.6  Winged priapic amulet  lxv
0.7  Empress Messalina working in a brothel  lxxx
0.8  Juliette and Clairwil sacrificing Olympe to the volcano  lxxxv
1.1  Map of Florence  17
1.2  The Farnese Hermaphrodite  32
2.1  Saint Peter’s Basilica  55
2.2  View of the Capitoline Hill, Rome  67
2.3  Engraving of church martyrs  120
4.1  Cockaigne of Naples  191
4.2  Cockaigne of Naples (vignette)  192
5.1  Crypta Neapolitana  262
5.2  Engraving of a spintrian medal  317
Colour Plates (following page 276)
1  The Education of Achilles by Chiron
2  Clemente Susini, anatomical model of a pregnant woman
3  Pierre-Jacques Volaire, Eruption of Vesuvius
4  Guido Reni, Magdalene
5  Stefano Maderno, Martyrdom of Santa Cecilia
6  Jean-Baptiste Tierce, Les ruines de Paestum
7  Group of Pan and goat
8  Gaetano Giulio Zumbo, Corruption of Bodies