Before the 'swinging sixties' it's supposed that sex was a socially taboo topic, never discussed and certainly not to be enjoyed. Maybe that's overstating the case but a little delving into the past shows the generations before the 60s were far from the prim and proper, old-fashioned conservatives we assume them to be. This book aims to set the record straight with incredible, true stories of debauchery and titillation that would make even the most liberal-minded, modern readers blush. It seems that as far as sex is concerned we have a lot to learn. From ancient times onwards, men and women have been, not to put too fine a point on it, obsessed. It seems that everyone from renowned classical philosophers to medieval popes, kings, queens and emperors to doctors, politicians, presidents and the man in the street were all, one way or another, 'at it'. Infamous figures such as the Borgias, the Marquis de Sade and Sir Richard Burton (the celebrated Victorian explorer and translator of that handbook of sexual positions The Kama Sutra, not the film star), are just the start. Revealing letters, diaries and court reports from the less famous are just as startling u the sheer diversity and creativity described both scandalous and sometimes hilarious.
