History of the Breast

by YALOM, MARILYN

• ISBN13: 9780345388940
• ISBN10: 0345388941
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-03-31
• Publisher: Ballantine Books

Summary

In this provocative, pioneering, and wholly engrossing cultural history, noted scholar Marilyn Yalom explores twenty-five thousand years of ideas, images, and perceptions of the female breast--in religion, psychology, politics, society, and the arts. Through the centuries, the breast has been laden with hugely powerful and contradictory meanings. There is the "good breast" of reverence and life, the breast that nourishes infants and entire communities, as depicted in ancient idols, fifteenth-century Italian Madonnas, and representations of equality in the French Revolution. Then there is the "bad breast" of Ezekiel's wanton harlots, Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth, and the torpedo-breasted dominatrix, symbolizing enticement and aggression. Yalom examines these contradictions--and illuminates the implications behind them. A fascinating, astute, and richly allusive journey from Paleolithic goddesses to modern day feminists, A History of the Breast is full of insight and surprises. As Yalom says, "I intend to make you think about women's breasts as you never have before." In this, she succeeds brilliantly.

Author Biography

Marilyn Yalom is a former professor of French and a senior scholar at the Clayman Institute for Gender Research at Stanford University. She is the author of widely acclaimed books, such as A History of the Breast, A History of the Wife, Birth of the Chess Queen, The American Resting Place (with photographer son Reid Yalom), How the French Invented Love, and, most recently, The Social Sex: A History of Female Friendship, co-authored with Theresa Donovan Brown. She lives in Palo Alto, California, with her husband, psychiatrist and author Irvin D. Yalom.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Changing Meanings	p. 3
The Sacred Breast: Goddesses, Priestesses, Biblical Women, Saints, and Madonnas	p. 9
The Erotic Breast: "Orbs of Heavenly Frame"	p. 49
The Domestic Breast: A Dutch Interlude	p. 91
The Political Breast: Bosoms for the Nation	p. 105
The Psychological Breast: Minding the Body	p. 147
The Commercialized Breast: From Corsets to Cyber-Sex	p. 159
The Medical Breast: Life-Giver and Life-Destroyer	p. 205
The Liberated Breast: Politics, Poetry, and Pictures	p. 241
The Breast in Crisis	p. 275
Notes	p. 283
Select Bibliography	p. 301
Index	p. 315
Illustration Credits	p. 329
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