Imagine that you are on a flight from London to New York. Perhaps you are even flying the world’s favorite airline™. The evening meal has long been consumed, and the flight is at that soul-crippling stage where the lights have dimmed and your erstwhile comrades are either hypnotized by the in-flight ‘entertainment’ or are quietly snuffling en route to a liquor-induced slumber. The elderly English maid to your right is gently sleeping off her Gordons, while the 30-something, Gap-clad bibleclasper to the left appears preoccupied with the movie channels, twitching intermittently as he emits some form of subsonic fundamentalist critique. A good time to read a book about penises? You just never know.

Ironically, the book is a reasonably innocuous looking work. Fittingly flesh-toned, with a fig leaf ‘flap’ obscuring a view of Michaelangelo’s ever self-conscious David, The Book of the Penis makes for a delightful flight’s reading. After all, half of us possess and are of necessity somewhat familiar with at least one specimen, and (review-wise) the possibilities for those deliciously smutty double entendres we seem to love are almost limitless. As is quickly made clear when reading Maggie Paley’s The Book of the Penis however, the penis is no joke. Neither, as it turns out, is the process of writing a review. To address the book without continually stooping to smutty humor is, well, it’s hard.

The Book of the Penis continues a growing tradition of coffee table literature. Were one to collect books about penises, it could be comfortably placed alongside Margaret Gore’s (1997) The Penis Book: An Owner’s Manual, Joseph Cohen’s (1999) The Penis Book and Alexandra Parson’s (1990) Facts and Phalluses. It is loosely organized into four major sections, successively considering the nature of penises, penis culture, customized penises, and the (apparently) secret life of men. Specific chapters are devoted to penises in the movies, penis fashion, gay attitudes to the penis, masturbation and fellatio. It contains the ‘inevitable’ (although perhaps therapeutically necessary) consideration of the whole ‘size’ issue, and attitudes towards the foreskin (for better or for worse) are also noted.

The most conspicuous strength of the book lies in the tone it has managed to realize. While it is appropriately irreverent in places (this is not science!), nowhere does it stoop to wholesale vulgarity. There are for example no photographs, although illustrator Sergio Ruzzier does his best. The book is well-researched and scholarly. Paley has clearly spent considerable time familiarizing herself with the anthropological, sociological, historical and ‘popular’ literature, as well as with the relevant Internet sites and support groups. In many ways, the work appears as a voyage of ‘personal’ discovery, with many of the chapters containing anecdotes, and her investigations involving friends and acquaintances, most notably the laconic Enrique, who provides an intermittent Watson to her no doubt ‘challenged’ Holmes.

Given such talent and knowledge, it is unfortunate that the book is occasionally used to perpetuate popular myths or editorialize. The ‘Secret Life of Men’ for example, quite openly suggests that men’s thoughts and actions are governed by their autocratic penises and a pathological need to play with them. Apparently, we men think about sex most of the time, and can scarcely use a toilet (much less a public toilet) without having a bit of a twiddle. Give me a break! Public toilets are not that clean for a start, and I know plenty of men who seem to live fruitful and satisfying lives without this degree of self-stimulatory desperation. Men over the age of 25 at least. Although such opinion may provide some ‘dissatisfied’ female readers with a explanation for their observations, touting such a view as fact serves little purpose other than humor, and maintains some unhelpful stereotypes besides. Whether the odd chuckle is enough clearly depends on the reader.

As the flight progresses, I begin to notice that the cabin service has markedly improved. Not only am I being promptly attended to when pressing the call, but my very presence seems to solicit offers of refreshment. Apparently, the stewards have taken somewhat of an interest in the book, as it turns out, virtually incapable of not noticing the enormous chapter headings glowing in the darkened cabin. "Enjoying the book?" each asks in turn, a pressing curiosity clearly conflicting with professional discretion on their smiling faces. I honestly reply that I am, although I am also compelled to add that I am a book reviewer (and thus do not actually ‘need’ to read the book). They are of course far too polite to do anything but nod and smile. Their ministrations continue, and upon disembarking I feel like a celebrity. Stewards from the other aisles call out from across the cabin, and the smiles of the door attendants are far more genuine than is customary. As I wander towards immigration I fall in step with the elderly English woman who had slept the entire flight. "Really liked the chapter on castration," she says with a wink. Not so sleepy after all, huh?

Having recently completed his dissertation in New Zealand, Nathan Consedine, Ph.D., is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Studies of Ethnicity and Human Development at Long Island University in New York. His many research interests include the development of evolutionary-functionalism, particularly as applied to emotion, consciousness and personality theory, as well as considering the relationships between emotions, aging, and health in an ethnic context. In his ‘spare’ time, he writes on Internet methods in psychological research.

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