Le sexe en solitaire: Contribution à l'histoire culturelle de la sexualité

by Thomas W. Laqueur

D'ouvrages en recherches, Thomas Laqueur élabore une histoire culturelle de la sexualité, marquée par la disjonction des représentations sociales et morales d'avec les éventuelles découvertes médicales : le discours sur la sexualité ignore l'entrave des faits...

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Sexuality, Science, Philosophy, Gender and Sexuality, Anthropology

512 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2003

About the author

Thomas W. Laqueur is an American historian, sexologist and writer.
He is the author of Solitary Sex : A Cultural History of Masturbation and Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud as well as many articles and reviews. He is the winner of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's 2007 Distinguished Achievement Award and is Professor of History at the University of California.

Reviews

[Carlos · Rating 4 out of 5]

This has got to be one of the most peculiar books I've read and not just for its title or size. Laqueur starts with a premise that is quite unexpected for the reader that of studying the cultural change of the last three centuries through their attitude towards this taboo topic. The end product demonstrates not only Laqueur abilities as a historian to gleam such unmarked centuries-old information but also the many ways in which this topic can serve to highlight the rise of modernity.

[Heidi Nemo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Laqueur. Even sex with yourself can be a social problem and a quest for identity, it seems.

[Emma Sea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Review to come (heh)

[Matti Karjalainen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thomas W. Laqueurin "Seksiä yksin - masturbaation kulttuurihistoria" (Into, 2019) on sinänsä ansiokas, mutta hetkittäin vähän raskassoutuinen yleisteos, jossa käydään läpi itsetyydytyksen historiaa.

Laqueurin mukaan itsetyydytys oli aluksi aika vähäpätöinen asia niin lääkäreiden, oppineiden kuin kirkonmiestenkin mielestä. Kreikkalaisten ja roomalaisten teksteissä aihe esiintyi enimmäkseen vitsinä turhautuneen miehen synkästä tilanteesta: se oli häpeällistä, koska se ei ollut oman aseman mukaista toimintaa, eikä tarpeita voitu tyydyttää muuten. Kuulemme tarinan Diogeneksesta, joka ei tarvinnut prostituoitujen palveluja, koska "hänen kätensä oli jo ennättänyt laulaa häälaulun" (s. 107), mitä hienompaa kiertoilmausta en ole mielestäni koskaan kuullut.

Kiinnostavaa kyllä, vielä nykyäänkin kirkollisten piirien siteeraama Raamatun kertomus "siemenensä maahan laskevasta" Onanista viittaa todennäköisemmin keskeytettyyn yhdyntään tai muuhun seksuaaliseen toimintaan, jonka tarkoituksena ei ole suvun jatkaminen. Se oli synti sinänsä, olihan ideana turvata yhteisön ja sukulinjan jatkuvuus.

Englantilaisen John Martenin "Onania" (1712) muutti tilanteen päinvastaiseksi, vaikka kyseessä oli aika halpahintainen viritelmä. Marten oli eräänlainen puoskari, joka esitti sooloseksin syypääksi mitä erilaisimpiin fyysisiin ja psyykkisiin ongelmiin.

Tulevilla vuosisadoilla tämä näkemys yleistyi, ja muun muassa Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant ja Sigmund Freud kokivat aiheen enemmän tai vähemmän ongelmalliseksi. Kantin mukaan itsetyydytys oli "vastoin luonnon tarkoitusta" ja "pahempaa kuin itsemurha" (s. 71). 1800-luvun jälkipuoliskolla elänyt amerikkalainen psykologi G. Stanley Hall katsoi sen olevan syypäänä suunnilleen kaikkiin nuoren ihmisen epämiellyttäviin piirteisiin, joista mainittakoon huumeriippuvuus ja "liiallinen kiinnostus teatteria kohtaan." (s. 83)

Synti katsottiin sen verran suureksi ja surkiaksi muuallakin kuin filosofien papereissa: Ranskan vallankumouksen mainingeissa eräs kuningatar Marie-Antoinettea kohtaan esitetty syytös oli, että hän oli opettanut pikkuprinssin masturboimaan.

Laqueur on kiinnostavimmillaan pohtiessaan romaanien lukemisen ja itsetyydytyksen yhteneväisyyksiä; molempia on 1700-luvulla pidetty yksin harjoitettavana paheena, joka kiihottaa mielikuvitusta ja synnyttää vaarallisia ajatuksia.

"Seksiä yksin" käsittelee vielä 1900-luvun vapautumista, joka kytkeytyy muun muassa naisasialiikkeen ja seksuaalivähemmistöjen nousuun. Lisäksi sivutaan myös niin maalaustaidetta kuin American Pie -elokuvien kaltaista populaarikulttuuria.

Lapsuudestani muistan lapsille ja nuorille suunnatun tietosanakirjan, jossa puhuttiin masturbaatiosta "itsesaastutuksena". Niinpä toivonkin, että tämä kirja edesauttaisi meitä kohti maailmaa, jossa aiheesta voitaisiin puhua ilman syyllistämistä ja paheellisuuden leimaa. Vielä on nimittäin matkaa kuljettavana, kuten lääkäri Ilkka Taipale toteaa kirjan esipuheessa:

Tämän esipuheen kirjoittaja nosti esiin nuorten yleisimmän seksuaalikäyttäytymisen eli masturbaatioon kohdistetun ivan ja häpeän (Helsingin kaupunginvaltuustossa, jossa syksyllä 2018 keskusteltiin sateenkaarinuorten sortamisesta koulussa). Sali hiljeni totaalisesti, joskin puheenjohtaja alkoi hihitellä. (s. 7).

[6655321 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ok, so the first thing is that while Laqueur is kinda completing one of the missing volumes of History of Sexuality (the figure of the Masturbator) while also undermining some of the thoughts that Foucault had (because tbh, Laqueur is like Boswell by other means which is not really a hard social constructionist and is maybe a little bit more genealogical in some ways because there isn't *an event* that is essentailized which isn't a slam on Foucault but more an explanation for why this book is 420 pages long). What is impressive about it is the ways in which even the book itself is a series of shaggy dog jokes about masturbation (including the *skip ahead to the good parts* bit that i swear is mimicking the tendency of porn viewership along with the constant and repetitious and just overtly masturbatory citations). But mostly like Laqueur's other work (Making Sex) the work is meticulous in its refusal to bow to an easy narrative tracing a frayed thread through a bunch of weird zigs and zags. Basically, this is a book to make you feel really weird about masturbation in like *a good and disquieting way* that compliments well with Jagose's Orgasamology and others books that are kinda in the *orbit* of queer theory but disquiet notions of sexuality in a *really good way* and thats a thing that doesn't get done enough?

[dejah_thoris · Rating 2 out of 5]

Whoohoo! A book about masturbation! Except it’s a collection of academic essays on the subject that ended up being about equal on hits and misses. Contemporaneous notes on each essay written during or immediately after reading.

1. Autonomy as Deviance: Sixteenth-Century Images of Witches and Prostitutes / Weigert

An excellent opening essay that included some interesting visuals. Did you know that witches enjoy wanking and touching each other? In fact, orgasm may be the power that allows them to fly. (If that fun fact was mentioned in history class, I clearly missed it.)

2. Playing with Herself: Feminine Sexuality and Aesthetic Indifference / Dennis

Titan’s Venus of Urbino is clearly touching herself. The rest of the essay is about mimesis, gaze, etc. in dull and academic terms. Skip unless you really like this sort of writing.

3. Forbidden Pleasures: Enlightenment Literature of Sexual Advice / Porter

This essay didn’t say much beyond acknowledging these books existed and lasted centuries. Masturbation books had even more disclaimers than sexual health manuals; otherwise, nothing new about the tension between having facts to prevent problems vs. facts causing curiosity and creating problems. Skip unless this information is new to you.

4. Phantastical Pollutions: The Public Threat of Private Vice in France / Rosario

Private pollution creates societal pollution. Therefore, a solitary erotic imagination is a danger to societal reproduction. Best part of this essay was learning the old word for masturbation, manustrupation (makes more sense because you use your hand), and the word for male nymphomaniacs, satyriasis.

5. Jane Austen and the Masturbating Girl / Sedgwick

Masturbator was a specific identity that is no longer represented in the current conceptualizations of sexual identity. Instead, it is considered a normal part of phase of sexual development. Marianne Dashwood of Sense and Sensibility is not bisexual, even though she loves people of both genders, but is truly a masturbating girl. Such an identity is not in opposition to other sexualities. Instead, it signifies an excess of sexuality altogether. Much of this essay may be hard to follow due to rarely used words and ideas. Skip if your mind wanders.

6. The Social Evil, the Solitary Vice, and Pouring Tea / Laqueur

Masturbation is bad (mmkay?) because it turns the individual back into themselves (“the solitary vice”) whereas heterosexual release through prostitution is slightly more acceptable (“the social evil”). Whores were thought to be barren because they took no pleasure in the exchange. Prostitution was viewed similarly as usury, which the Church banned because it produced no real goods. Therefore, it is the social context of the act that determines acceptability. A decent essay, but rather short and barely mentions masturbation or pouring tea.

7. “The Roots of the Orchis, the Iuli of Chestnuts”: The Odor of Male Solitude / Looby

The smell of semen acts a specific reminder of taboo acts because procreative sex never exposes it to air thereby allowing it volatize. Citing Bataille, the mainspring of eroticism is transgressions suspend a taboo without suppressing it. Masturbation is self-divided; the hand being separate from the genitals and the otherness of the scent of semen. Anti-masturbation tracts must arouse before punishing by associating the odor of semen with stigmatized odors of the lower body, such as blood, urine, pus, etc. This was a very good essay and definitely worth reading.

8. “Pomegrante-Flowers”: The Phantasmic Productions of Late-Nineteenth Century Anglo-
American Women Poets / Bennett

This essay explores the relationship of women writers exploring and sharing their sexual desires and pleasure through the coded language of the nineteenth century. Well written in layperson’s language and includes supporting poetry excerpts.

9. Fragments of a Poetics: Bonnetain and Roth / Schehr

Writing and masturbation go together like a hand and phallus. Naturalism allowed writers to depict “negative” behaviors as long as those participating were later punished somehow. I dislike Freudian psychoanalysis, but Portnoy’s Complaint sounds like an interesting novel. This essay is permeated with very academic language, so if you prefer descriptive novels, skip this essay and read Portnoy’s Complaint instead.

10. Can Robinson Crusoe Find True Happiness (Alone)? Beyond the Genitals and History on the Island of Hope / Celestin

This essay relies on Tournier’s Robinson Crusoe who, unlike Defoe’s, remains on the island instead of returning home at the end of the novel. He evolves on the island from Puritan capitalist to a “solar sexuality” that is circular instead of linear and requires no reference to a specific other. (According to Robinson, Friday showed up too late on the scene for to him to merely become gay.) Tournier’s interpretation sounds like a very strange work, so if you’re curious about it, try wading through the academic language of this essay.

11. Coming in Handy: The J/O Spectacle and the Gay Male Subject in Almodovar / Jackson

Relies on two of Almodovar’s films shot in the same year with the same principal actors and opening with masturbation scenes. Law of Desire opens as a scene being shot on a porn set whereas Matador depicts a man masturbating to murder scenes in front of his VCR. – I had to abandon this essay because it had far too much Freudian visual analysis and jargon. I’m sure there’s someone who can follow this essay and find it compelling, but it definitely ain’t me.

[Círdan · Rating 3 out of 5]

很不错的研究，但是前面好啰嗦，不过社会学类的学术作品是不是都讲究罗列很多材料，只是在我们外行看来很啰嗦，里面和社会变化结合的部分论述得很好，但是心理学部分引入得很不好，像在说梦话一样。
发现有些书可以听不用买之后，尝试听了一下，就突然发现自己上学时上课必睡的原因了。

[Kent · Rating 4 out of 5]

Needed a good editor; just because you found evidence doesn't mean you should include every piece of evidence
The book/argument/evidence particularly suffers in the final chapter - it is obvious Laqueur ran out of time to finish the book after spending so much time finding evidence and writing the pre-1880s sections. The result is he glosses over all kinds of subcultures/groups that existed and produced written records from the late 19th into the mid-20th centuries and instead concludes (generally) that only Freud and sexologists discussed masturbation during the period until the 1960s when out of no where the women's and LGBTQ movements started writing about it. The last chapter also oddly shifts focus from Western Europe to the US once we get to the 1960s, whereas the overwhelming majority of the rest of the book says little about the US/US-based writers. The "counter-cultural" movements of the 1960s-onward had strong voices coming from the US, but they existed throughout Europe, too. Not to mention that if Laqueur is correct that Freud is the linchpin between the Enlightenment ideas of masturbation and today's ability to conceive of it as a method for liberation/community/individualism, then he needs to also explain how US-based voices overtake those from Freud's cultural homeland (Western Europe) - particularly when Freud remained popular in the US.
Nonetheless, Laqueur has provided the "high level" intellectual/cultural tracing of masturbation throughout Western history that was needed - if still limited by his general reliance on white & male writers and lack of engagement with writers of color and women. This is not to say he neglects gender - he does a strong job of identifying how the idea/values of masturbation played out differently for women and men and the writers he focuses on could think gender mattered a great deal when it came to masturbation -- but it is difficult to believe only Freud and other male sexologists wrote about (and are the only ones with surviving evidence) masturbation between say 1880 and 1960.

[Anni · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kiinnostava aihe, mutta niin kuivasti kirjoitettu että epäilin pääsenkö loppuun asti ollenkaan.

[Leandra Cate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Laqueur's earlier book, Making Sex, was one of those rare reading moments that changed the course of my thinking and, at the time, my scholarship. Clever, insightful, different, daring, well-researched. The same things could be said of Solitary Sex but with not so devastating and complete an impact. A very enjoyable and detailed book that doesn't quite tie up its central point about masturbation (or rather anxiety about masturbation) becoming a cultural fixation as a result of the Enlightenment refiguring of the self. Not for lack of trying, though. He certainly reiterates his point often enough and proves it with a multitude of small textual moments, but overall, the argument is unconvincing. Particularly lame was his uneven treatment of pornography, which he does not discuss at all despite its obvious relationship to masturbation until he comes to his over-long discussion of the feminist/lesbian reclaiming of porn and masturbation. This makes his point seem lopsided. However, a lot of good analysis on a topic I'd never really considered in this light.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Investigates how masturbation has been viewed culturally, primarily Western culture and mostly from the eighteenth century to the twentieth century. Some mention of Japan as well. Looks some at antiquity as well. Argues that masturbation was unimportant to most before the eighteenth century, that the enlightenment, and advent of free market, solitary reading and privacy coalesced to make masturbation appear much more threatening to civilization than it had before. As better theories (germ theory) and general better health and longevity improved living conditions for most, it became clear masturbation did not have the negative health effects it was claimed to. It's opponents were forced to wind down their rhetoric. Today masturbation is viewed alternately as liberating, self- enhancing, and among conservatives still askance.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

ordered from the library ILL Nov 23

read a 15 page review by stephen greenblatt
nybooks.com/articles/archives/2004/ap...?


good discussion of the early 1700's of the quack who invented onanism and its infernal diseases with his concoctions to cure them.

not so good about Freud

as the chapters go by it seems that the trouble with mast was more with the fantasies than with the rubbing


Contents:
I The Beginning 13 --
II The Spread of Masturbation from Onania to the Web 25 --
III Masturbation Before Onania 83 --
IV The Problem with Masturbation 185 --
V Why Masturbation Became a Problem 247 --
VI Solitary Sex in the Twentieth Century 359.

[Maria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ένα από τα καλύτερα βιβλία που έχω διαβάσει στη ζωή μου. Ο Laqueur αποτελεί κεφάλαιο ως καθηγητής ιστορίας, πόσο μάλλον όταν διδάσκει στο ίδιο πανεπιστήμιο με την ανυπέρβλητη Butler. Αυτός είναι και ο λόγος που διάβασα το συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο, καθώς υπήρχε στη βιβλιογραφία μιας δημοσίευσής της.

Πρόκειται για μία ιστορική και πολιτισμική ανάλυση της αυτοϊκανοποίησης. Σκοπός του δεν είναι ούτε να σοκάρει, ούτε να προσβάλει. Στόχος του βιβλίου είναι να αναδείξει τις κοινωνικές αναπαραστάσεις των ιστορικών περιόδων μέσα από την εξερεύνηση της αυτοϊκανοποίησης και να προβάλει τα ζητήματα φύλου.

Μια σπουδαία ιστορική έρευνα, με εξαιρετική προσέγγιση και μεγάλο ενδιαφέρον.

[Yupa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dalla prima metà del '700 sino alla seconda metà del '900 l'autoerotismo, sia maschile che femminile, è diventato un problema di prima grandezza in Europa, nelle menti di pensatori, medici, commentatori sociali, di tutti coloro che avevano a che fare col governo dell'individuo. Oggi rimane il detto scherzoso che "fa diventare ciechi", ma al tempo questa era ritenuta una conseguenza reale, realissima, insieme a tutto un corteo di altri malanni fisici, tra cui persino il decesso, e a dimostrarlo c'era tutta una profusione di quella che al tempo era ritenuta scienza, di cui solo pochi dubitavano.
Non che prima, specie nei secoli del dominio cristiano, l'autoerotismo non fosse malvisto, ma era una trasgressione, un peccato sì, ma non così importante, non suscitava tutto questo allarme e preoccupazione, non era un fenomeno reputato dilagante e degno di indagini ossessive e interventi capillari.
Lo scopo del libro è proporre un'ipotesi (una delle tante proposte nel tempo, va detto) su perché proprio a partire dall'inizio del '700 esplosero questo interesse e questa preoccupazione.
L'autore esibisce un'erudizione impressionate, è uno di quei casi in cui ti chiedi dove trovi il tempo per leggere tutto quello che ha letto. Cita centinaia di testi odierni e del tempo, ne ha esaminate le varie edizioni, arriva a far riferimenti a pagine e note e contronote. Insomma, la sa lunga.
La sua ipotesi, affascinante e in gran parte corroborata da una gran quantità di dati, è che l'autoerotismo fu un problema pressante nel momento in cui divennero fondamentali, per la società del tempo, tre elementi: l'immaginazione, la vita privata, l'autonomia dell'individuo. L'autoerotismo costituirebbe il doppio oscuro su cui convergono questi tre elementi, una versione degenerata dell'individuo ideale del tempo, l'individuo autonomo, bisognoso quindi di controllo e disciplina. Ad esempio è nel momento in cui si impone come novità la lettura come attività privata, da svolgere in silenzio nelle proprie stanze, consumando romanzi per diletto, che sorge la preoccupazione che quest'attività, con la sua lontananza dall'occhio pubblico, possa indurre la tentazione di indulgere nel sesso solitario.
Ma nonostante la gran copia di nozioni mobilitate dall'autore a sostegno della sua tesi, che comunque ritengo in buona parte convincente, ritengo che per alcuni versi guardi dalla parte sbagliata, e che soprattutto perda di vista un fattore fondamentale. Guarda dalla parte sbagliata perché alcuni dei mali che al tempo venivano ascritti all'autoerotismo, ovvero l'abuso dell'immaginazione e l'eccesso e la mancanza di autocontrollo, e che l'autore accoglie pacificamente come cause della preoccupazione dei contemporanei rispetto allo stesso, in realtà sono mali che vengono tipicamente ascritti a quelle pratiche devianti che la società fatica ad accettare, a prescindere dall'epoca e dalle pratiche: la minaccia alla capacità di distinguere tra realtà e finzione è qualcosa che si sente sin dalle polemiche degli antichi contro il teatro e arriva a chi oggi si scaglia contro i videogiochi; mentre l'eccesso, la presunta incapacità di contenere i propri impulsi, è tipicamente associata a ogni pratica sessuale che è stata definita come deviante, che quindi sarebbe non solo sbagliata per gli oggetti verso cui si indirizza, ma minacciosa perché sempre incontrollabile. Determinate caratteristiche ascritte al tempo all'autoerotismo non andrebbe quindi viste in maniera non problematica come cause effettive dell'ansia sociale che circondava la pratica, bensì come tipici segnali che era in atto un'ansia sociale le cui cause sfuggivano agli stessi protagonisti, e che cercavano di razionalizzare tirando in ballo le minaccia della fantasia o della mancanza di controllo. Ma le cause erano più profonde.
La mancanza che a me stupisce, nel libro, è che nonostante l'autore sfiori la questione della formazione dell'individuo, e citi a più riprese proprio Rousseau, gli sfugga proprio la questione della pedagogia. Forse non l'unico fattore, ma sicuramente uno di quelli principali nella questione dell'autoerotismo era l'educazione dei più giovani, dei bambini e degli adolescenti. I secoli analizzati dall'autore sono quelli in cui si sviluppa via via la tecnica della formazione dell'individuo come scienza e poi in cui si ha in embrione l'idea dell'innocenza dei più piccoli rispetto alle cose sessuali, idea che raggiungerà il suo apice a fine '800, per poi essere problematizzata, tra percorsi molto tortuosi, solo nel XX secolo. Impossibile parlare della lotta all'autoerotismo senza considerare come la società e soprattutto le sue teste pensanti stessero costruendo tutta una rete di controlli, discipline e pratiche volte a formare il buon individuo. Queste cose erano centrali proprio in Rousseau, con la sua idea della pedagogia "naturale", in cui qualunque intervento "artificioso" o "artificiale" rischiava di compromettere uno sviluppo retto e sano, una naturalità tuttavia alla cui ombra stava proprio la questione della sessualità e, alla fine, dell'autoerotismo: in questa nuova visione del giovane innocente che avrebbe acquisito maturità e consapevolezza solo dopo una lunga attesa, con l'inevitabile problema di stabilire come gestire, dal parte del Mondo adulto, questa attesa, l'autoerotismo era il punto problematico di convergenza del dilemma tra sviluppo naturale e formazione come tecnica guidata dall'alto, era qualcosa che non si sapeva come amministrare, una variabile talmente ingestibile da risultare inaccettabile e, quindi da negare e, in ultima istanza, da reprimere.

[Shane · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not read the entire book, but thought it worth listing. Any cultural-history book about masturbation will always get my approval!

[Lisa Schneider · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very comprehensize history of matsturbation. Also, an interesting study about how central masutrbuation has been to the idea and formation of the modern self.

[Hoyadaisy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating!

[Blair Hodges · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thomas Laqueur tackles a taboo topic with candor. This book shares the same strengths and weaknesses as Laqueur's new book "The Work of the Dead": fascinating topic, meandering organization.

[Michael Adam Reale · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book Review: Solitary Sex: A Cultural History of Masturbation

Thomas W. Laqueur
New York: Zone Books, 2003. 501 pp. $34.00

Introduction

Thomas W. Laqueur’s Solitary Sex is a sweeping cultural and intellectual history of masturbation, tracing its emergence as a medical, moral, and social problem from the early eighteenth century to the late twentieth century. While the subtitle promises a “cultural history,” the book is most deeply invested in the medical and moral dimensions of solitary pleasure, situating masturbation at the heart of modernity’s anxieties about excess, imagination, and private space.

Central Argument

Laqueur challenges the common narrative that masturbation was pathologized primarily because of concerns about reproductive scarcity. Instead, he argues that it was constructed as a problem of excess—a practice without natural limits, fueled by fantasy, and threatening to spiral out of control. In this framing, masturbation became emblematic of modernity’s democratizing yet destabilizing energies: “the first democratic, equal opportunity would-be vice.”

The book situates masturbation alongside other practices of indulgence—credit spending, novel reading—that were seen as dangerous precisely because they were private, imaginative, and potentially disengaging from social life. When religious authority waned, medical experts stepped in to regulate this new terrain of private behavior, mapping out an ethic of sexual conduct that would dominate for centuries.

Historical Trajectory

Laqueur traces the genealogy of masturbation panic to John Marten’s Onania (1712), a pamphlet that blended moral warning with medical sensationalism and commercial opportunism. The discourse gained legitimacy with Samuel-Auguste Tissot’s L’Onanisme (1760), which medicalized the supposed dangers of self-pollution. Rousseau’s Émile reinforced these anxieties in the realm of pedagogy, ensuring that masturbation was not only a medical but also a moral and educational concern.

The cultural force of masturbation discourse lay in this twinning of medicine and pedagogy. Only with Freud’s reframing of masturbation as a normal stage of infantile development did the juggernaut begin to lose its grip. Laqueur closes with late twentieth-century feminist and gay liberation movements, which reclaimed masturbation as both a symbolic and practical act of autonomy against patriarchal regulation.

Strengths

• Breadth and originality: Laqueur’s meticulous research and expansive scope make this a landmark text in the history of sexuality.
• Conceptual innovation: By reframing masturbation as a problem of excess rather than scarcity, Laqueur offers a provocative reinterpretation of modernity’s sexual anxieties.
• Interdisciplinary reach: The book bridges medical history, moral philosophy, pedagogy, and cultural studies, making it essential reading across fields.


Limitations

some gaps:

• Gender analysis: While Laqueur acknowledges that women were often depicted as more prone to masturbation (especially through novel reading), he does not provide a sustained analysis of how gender shaped the discourse.
• Pedagogical utility: The length and density of chapters make the book challenging for classroom use, despite its rich potential as a teaching text.


Conclusion

Solitary Sex is a monograph of breathtaking scope, joining Laqueur’s earlier Making Sex as essential reading in the history of sexuality. It reframes masturbation as a cultural touchstone of modernity—anxiously policed, endlessly debated, and ultimately reclaimed. While future scholarship will need to deepen the gendered analysis and explore reproductive dimensions more fully, Laqueur’s work remains a foundational text for anyone seeking to understand the intimate intersections of sexuality, medicine, and modern selfhood.

[Iñaki Tofiño · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is amazing how such a banal and widespread human activity as masturbating had been overlooked for centuries by moralists and philosophers, the butt of a few jokes but not much else in either Jewish, Classical or Christian traditions. Only after the publication of Onania; Or, the Heinous Sin of Self-Pollution, and All Its Frightful Consequences, in Both Sexes, Considered, with Spiritual and Physical Advice ... the Fourth Edition. around 1712 it became the most heinous crime, condemned by doctors and priests alike until the 1970s, when sexual liberationists vindicated it as an example of human freedom and self-expression (pun intended).
Laqueur does a very good job analysing tons of material but somehow comes short at the end, in a sort of premature ejaculation, when he closes the book with a short paragraph in the middle of a line of reasoning. In any case, extremely interesting and worth reading.

[Amu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Erinomaisen perusteellinen, kiinnostava ja hyvin kirjoitettu historia siitä, miten itsetyydytykseen on suhtauduttu ja mitä merkityksiä sille on annettu eri aikoina. Keskiössä on 1700-luku, jolloin itsetyydytyksestä tehtiin itsenäinen, kauhistuttava pahe.

Tämä kirja vertautuu myös tänä kesänä lukemaani kirjaan Kädellä - itsetyydytyksen historia. Älkää lukeko sitä, lukekaa tämä.

[Vincenzo Ridente · Rating 4 out of 5]

An inside erotic look into the joy of Masturbation

[CHEON AN · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book stigmatized masturbation.

[Wenjing Fan · Rating 1 out of 5]

胡扯还是比较多的，不太喜欢//早年看的，2024年给男作者改低分