SEX IN HISTORY

by G. Rattray Taylor ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 11, 1954

A stimulating, intellectual book with a provocative range of case and idea illustrations is offered as more than a history -- a working theory to account for changes in sexual attitudes in the past thousand years. The survey of attempts to control the irrational elements in man's makeup, specifically sexual drives, during the Christian Era in Western Europe and especially in England reveals variants in attitudes based, the author believes, on mother-identification and father-identification. In terms of permissive matrism and authoritarian patrism he places the pre- Christian freedom of the Celts, the repression of sex as the Church ideal in the Middle Ages which resulted in ""mass psychosis"" in action, the ways of the troubadors and the Cathars, stern Reformation against growing matrism, the license of the Age of Reason, the Romantic contribution of ideal love in marriage, the sex-denial of rigid Victorianism, the trend toward matrism of a dependent sort today. Sallies into the origin of the pattern which subsists today drive deep into Graeco-Roman thought and earlier Eastern beliefs. The role of religion may alert some but will probably be accepted by the quickwitted reader as all part of the show. Serious psychology seasoned and exaggerated for the modern meditator.

Pub Date: May 11, 1954

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Vanguard

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1954

Categories: NONFICTION