A few books on love, marriage, and relationships are scattered throughout the Love & Sex section of Barnes & Nobel, but the vast majority are purely on the subject of sex. Of the sex books, several have the words "Kama Sutra" in the title. Considering that B&N can only house a small percentage of all books available in the English language, what I can flip through in the store is only the tip of the iceberg of sex books. Many, many more can be ordered online. With all these sex books available, where do we start our Kama Sutra project?
Should we adhere to the most original, scholarly translation and interpretation of dear Vatsyayana's text or something more accessible? Is there great wisdom to be gained from the old text, or is it entirely out-of-date and chauvinistic? It certainly doesn't seem to be a stimulating read for the bedroom. Something with a few more photos and explicit instructions might be a little more helpful. After some debate, we decided to explore both, so that our kama sutra experience would be for the mind and for the body.
The Mind
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| The Complete Kama Sutra: The First Unabridged Modern Translation of the Classic Indian Text, Translated by Alain Danielou; Park Street Press, 1994; ISBN: 978-0892814923 |
For our scholarly understanding of the Kama Sutra, we're reading The Complete Kama Sutra: The First Unabridged Modern Translation of the Classic Indian Text. This two-pound, 564-page tome includes translation by Alain Danielou, whose name appears French, but writing appears English, plus lots and lots of interpretation by Devadatta Shastri. As we blog, we'll refer to this text as the Big Book. You can buy your own copy online or in store from Barnes & Noble if you have the cojones to face the checkout clerk, like our Corazana. Lynn's going the audiobook route via iTunes.
The Body
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| Kama Sutra Step By Step, DK Publishing, 2009ISBN: 978-0756650421 |
For our recreational reading, we decided upon DK's Kama Sutra Step By Step, which I could only find online through Amazon.
