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black cloth hardbound 8vo. dustwrapper in protective plastic book jacket cover. fine cond. binding square & tight. covers clean. cloth a little mottled along the very top. edges clean. contents free of all markings. dustwrapper in near fine cond. couple of minor tears on the rear, 1" tear rear flap edge, not price clipped. nice clean copy. no library markings, store stamps, stickers, bookplates, no names, inking , underlining, remainder markings etc ~ first american edition. first printing (nap). b&w frontis. 208p. + 28 b&w illustrations. chapter notes. index. history. psychology. psychiatry. mythology. literature. anthropology. archaeology. art history. gustav von aschenbach. bronzino duke of urbino. ~ IN THIS HIGHLY ORIGINAL and controversial book, an eminent Danish psychiatrist considers the phallus as a symbol of power and dominance in life, literature, and art throughout history. In particular, he points to the use of phallic symbols as signals in the management of rank order among males. The most challenging aspect of Phallos is Dr. Vanggaard's belief in what he calls the homosexual radical~the drive toward a temporary hierarchical relationship endowed with a complex symbolism between a young man and his older mentor both of whom are otherwise normally heterosexual. He examines the nature and significance of this impulse, its manifestations in different cultures, and its fate in our own. The suppression of this homosexual component is a legacy of Judeo~Christianity and came about as a result of the clash between the Jewish and the Greco~Roman cultures in the fourth century A.D. Much later, seemingly during the nineteenth century, this suppression developed into a firm repression, banning from the consciousness of heterosexual men any awareness of their inherent homosexual proclivities. Both individually and socially, this is impoverishing: it has reduced the value of friendship between men and created difficulties, yet unresolved, in male relationships established on a dominance~submission axis. The customs of ancient Greek and Norse cultures are compared with modern clinical experience, and this is supplemented with some recent observations on the behavior of primates. Thorkil Vanggaard's stimulating book is likely to provoke much discussion: it is bold, lively and scholarly, an important contribution to the related fields of psychology, sociology and ethology. Seller Inventory # 2281207
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