By Shantell Powell
Sexus Animalis is a beautifully illustrated and easy-to-read overview of sex in the animal kingdom. It was originally written in French by Emmanuelle Pouydebat, a permanent researcher employed by the French National Centre for Scientific Research at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris. Julie Terrazzoni’s illustrations are frame-worthy, and I’d gladly hang them in my house, although upon a double take visitors may wonder why I have a gay dolphin orgy on my wall.
I was raised with a repressive religious background where anything that was not cisgender, heterosexual monogamy was considered an abomination. However, I was also raised on the land around all sorts of animals, which made me wonder why cishet monogamists are outnumbered by “unnatural” sexual practices taking place in the natural world. This book provides a fascinating selection of how cishet sexual interactions are just one small facet of what is actually natural.
While there is nothing unnatural happening in nature, there sure are all sorts of things that some humans may find fantastically strange or kinky. Within the animal kingdom, there are all sorts of sex organs and ways they fit together. Polyandrous, polygamous, monogamous, and self-impregnating creatures abound. So do bisexual, heterosexual, homosexual, and interspecies relations. Masturbation is common to many species, and some creatures spontaneously change sex (the basis for Jurassic Park is real).
Penises come in all shapes, sizes, and abilities. Some are detachable. Some are spiked. Some are doubled-up. Some have four heads, and some are prehensile, which comes in handy for scratching itchy bellies. But while there are reams of papers written on penises, there is a woeful dearth of literature on clitorises and vaginas. It seems misogyny in scientific research has spread outside the study of humans. This is a big hole in our knowledge, and for what? The author invites researchers to rectify this oversight. Other sex organs are equally as amazing as penises.
The book is well designed. The typeface is easy to read and has ample margins. I find that many books cram the text too close to the middle of the book, which means you have to spread the pages so far you risk cracking the spine. This is not the case here, and to top it off, the paper is also of high quality.
Although this book is written with an adult audience in mind, it is the sort of book I would have loved as a child. Scientific terminology is used, but the book does not shy away from common slang or puns, which makes me wonder what slang and puns are in the original French version. Kudos to translator Erik Butler for making sure the English version of Sexus Animalis is easy to understand and fun to read. I tore through this book at record speed and enjoyed sharing the illustrations with my housemates. You’ll have all sorts of wild trivia to share after reading this one, and a whole new way of looking at the birds and the bees.
Thank you to MIT Press for a complimentary copy in exchange for an honest review.