Manhood: The Rise and Fall of the Penis |  | Author: Mels van Driel
Creator: Paul Vincent
Publisher: Reaktion Books
Category: Book
List Price: $35.00
Buy New: $21.83
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Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 408504
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 288
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.3
ISBN: 1861895429
Dewey Decimal Number: 610
EAN: 9781861895424
ASIN: 1861895429
Publication Date: January 30, 2010
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
The ancient Greeks paraded enormous sculptural replicas in annual celebration . . . Freud theorized that women envied them . . . an undeniable, global symbol of power and virility since the beginning of humankindâthe penis has been much discussed, gestured toward, and depicted, yet seldom understood outside folklore and popular cultureâs uneasy mix of self-deprecation and aggrandizement. Despite the penisâs central role in human life or perhaps due to that role, nearly every man seems to suffer in isolation or silence from some perceived inadequacy or affliction. Thatâs where experienced urologist and sexologist Mels van Driel comes in. In Manhood, van Driel offers an unprecedented history of the penisâwith answers to everything you wanted to know, and even some questions youâd never thought to ask. Â In Manhood, van Driel presents the history of the male sexual organ from medical, psychological, and cultural perspectives. Investigating the penis and its functions, from the scrotum to the glans, Van Drielâs work ranges from inguinal hernia to infertility, and from impotence to the speed of ejaculation. Psychological factors that have an impact on sexual experience, as well as contemporary phenomena, such as cyber sex, are given enlightening treatment along the way. Â With good humor and much insight, van Driel offers diverse and instructive examples. This informative guide is not just a book for men, but for women tooâanyone curious to know the facts behind the many myths and stories of the penis. Â
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| Customer Reviews:
 Everything you ever wanted to know and were afraid to ask May 19, 2010
Grady Harp (Los Angeles, CA United States)
Mels Van Driel is a Dutch urologist and sexologist who has obviously not only studied his disciplines well, but who also has the ability to communicate his depth of information with clarity (due in part to the English translation from the Dutch by Paul Vincent), candor, and a fine sense of humor. Though the 'mission' of this book is to explore the male genitalia in anatomic, functional, physiological, and psychological detail, van Driel also has the good sense/sensitivity to include the history of the response to this primary organ from recorded history to the present. And the differences between Greek perception and contemporary understanding are fascinating to ponder.
The author's description of the anatomy, from primitive unisex function in utero to the ultimate adult stage, is concise and thorough and is accompanied by many drawings and images that illustrate the points he makes. And after introducing this completed embryologic and adult transformation of the origin of life organ, he devotes chapters to cultural anomalies in penile perception and function (the section on Russian Skoptsy sect's rituals is enlightening to the extreme!) - tales of bizarre rituals that alone are worth the price of this book.
But van Driel doesn't stop with urological matters or anatomic variations, but instead opens the book to the very contemporary concerns of psychological nature that now have found their way into conversation, the Internet, magazines, and television commercials for Erectile Dysfunction. This is a solid book for those who want to understand the human anatomy, diseases, and emotional and psychological implications surrounding this topic. It is well written and deserves to be taken seriously by both students in medical school and nursing school as well as libraries of all those who want to understand one of the great mysteries of the human body. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, May 10
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know July 1, 2010
Amos Lassen (Little Rock, Arkansas)
Van Driel, Mels. ¡§Manhood: The Rise and Fall of the Penis¡¨, Reaktion Books, 2010.
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know
Amos Lassen
What an informative book! Van Driel, a Dutch urologist gives us the myths, the history, medical information and in fact everything you ever wanted to k now about the penis. We see that the male sexual organ has long been misunderstood (although many of my friends seem to understand it completely º). He tells us about the male anatomy with humor and it makes reading this a lot of fun. This is truly a historical tour of the penis and I doubt you will have many questions after reading it. Looking at the penis from psychological, medical and cultural points of view, he looks at the ¡§length¡¨ of the penis throughout time. We learn about ailments, misconceptions and myths about it and while they are few photographs, there are a lot of diagrams.
We are told about the penis from its formation in utero through the development of the adult male. There are chapters about anomalies both cultural and medical and we learn of rituals that are bizarre. From the psychological point of view we learn about the penis on the internet, in modern magazines and on television (those penile erectile dysfunction ads). There is a great deal of information here and while written with humor, the book is quite serious and I recommend it highly.
Minutiae February 1, 2010
Rick Johnson (Ratcliff, AR USA)
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
A columnist for National Review recommended this book and I haven't been disappointed. Lots of interesting little bits of tid, in particular historical, but also pertaining to health, eroticism, sports etc. It's hard to believe that I knew so little about something of such importance.
 A slight disappointment... February 25, 2010
Joe Cortez (Salinas, CA)
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
The book is indeed quite informed and well researched. Mels Van Driel seems to cover every ailment to the penis imaginable, from ED to prostate cancer. It covers misconceptions, current, as well as historical, about the penis and its ailments.
There is however, one bone of contentment (pardon the pun) that I have with Mels Van Driel, and that is his hesitance to discuss the foreskin, which is quite a substantial, healthy, and normal part of basic male anatomy. While other parts of the penis are given their proper respect, some even getting their own heading, the foreskin, it seems, is only mentioned as it pertains to possible illness and its treatment. For example, he only mentions the foreskin as it pertains to the accumulation of smegma, or the development of the rare, but real problem of phimosis. This is unfair, as one never begins to talk about toes, for example, as being susceptible to fungus and ingrown toe-nails. One never begins to talk about a woman's breasts as organs that are susceptible to breast cancer. The fact that the female vulva can accumulate smegma is not the first thing talked about when presenting female anatomy.
Van Driel does correctly state that phimosis is quite rare, and that the foreskin does not usually retract until later years. He further elaborates on the fact that circumcision is not medically necessary, and that it is for the most part, performed as a matter of custom or religious conviction. He gives a brief, but accurate account of the history of the medicalization of circumcision from the Victorian Era to today, but does not challenge some of the latest assertions, i.e, that it works as an HIV preventative; he merely ends on the note that that is the direction in which the pendulum of "health circumcision" is swinging, without challenging the "studies" beign used to promote it that way, and who wrote them (ie, that they were written by Robert Bailey, long-time advocate of infant circumcision, and Jewish researcher Daniel Halperin, who's particular religious affiliation presents a conflict of interest.)
Furthermore, most pictures or diagrams in the book do not present male anatomy as it occurs in nature; most, if not all diagrams, portray the penis without the foreskin, as if that is the way it is found in nature. The female vulva is never shown without labia and/or the clitoris in diagrams. Lo, the only picture of the anatomically correct penis is that of the statue of Michelangelo's David on the front cover, though, even this rendition of the male penis has undergone the knife, according to Van Driel.
Well versed, but overall, this book is a bit of a disappointment, coming from a European source, who, one would assume, would be far better versed on the human prepuce than his American counterparts. I've yet to come across a publication or textbook that gives the foreskin, a normal, natural part of basic male anatomy, its due respect. Van Driel has failed to deliver.
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