The East, the West, and Sex: A History of Erotic Encounters

Rings true to my self-referential if anecdotal experience. The very day I registered for the draft I also purchased a copy of Sir Richard "Dirty Dick" Burton's Tales of the Arabian Nights. Later in Southeast Asia I queried my First Sergeant on condoms of choice: "Red, White, & Blue son." Yankee Imperialism y-e-s! Off to wise old mommy san in her 20's--compared to her younger sisters who looked like what I danced with in junior high school. I survived to live in Trieste, Italy, once home to Burton himself, where bookstores "stocked" (Stock furnishes the local wine and spirits) his works. Yet shortly before Hong Kong retrocessed from Crown Colony, outpost of empire, to Chinese sovereignty, nary a copy of Rudyard Kipling was to be found. One could still drink with Gurkhas in Aussie-Kiwi owned Oirish pubs with Filipina maids--and Gunga Dins hustling fools in the East. But by then massages and suchlike creature comforts cost as much as back home. Compare Sheridan Prasso's earlier and excellent work "The Asian Mystique: Dragon Ladies, Geisha Girls, and Our Fantasies of the Exotic Orient." I met herself signing books at the China Institute in New York City, took in her slender petite form and concluded (1) she could put Asian ladies of like size at complete ease, and (2) she hopefully couldn't resist the urge to don a Geisha's kimono and pose for a photo. Thankfully she did. Bernstein by comparison in a fellow male light-skinned round-eyed infiltrator. Whether or not we made the slightest impression on Asia--Asia left an indelible mark on us. I'm acquainted with a Chinese born American woman (CBA instead of American born Chinese ABC). Her father reflected Bernstein's depicture. I know Indian women of various ages true to Bernstein's observations on both the British raj and following. And I have Thai lady friends and friends who are quite simply ladies. To quote my late father: "Seventeen years in Sunday school--one night in Bangkok." Now more mature there's things I would do again, thing I wouldn't do again, and things I couldn't do again. This is both a sweet and bittersweet read.

Despite the alluring title, this is a serious work of scholarship. Bernstein's readable, wide ranging book addresses Westerners fascination with the mysterious East from Victorian novelists slumming in Egyptian brothels to plane-loads of sex-tourists descending on Thailand. In some ways, this book is a counter-blast to Said's Orientalism the premise of which was (in simplified form): sexual mores were no more lax in the East than in the West, it was just the Westerner's need to project their own values on "the other". Bernstein combines a combination of historical research with contemporary interviews in a style that is lucid and readable. This book comes to some startling conclusions: Maybe there was a sexual reason why many American servicemen volunteered for repeat tours of duty in Vietnam, and there may be worse things in life than being a go-go dancer in a Thai bar catering to foreigners.

The East has always had allure for the West, and has offered a place where sexual pleasure is not necessarily associated with sin. Its different culture and perspectives have long offered Westerners morally ambiguous opportunities mostly unavailable at home. The region's erotic history is mapped in a survey of both individuals and nations, with a focus upon their interactions with Westerners. The result is a fine account for both college-level and general-interest collections.

The very words are exotic - think of the harem, the geisha, the Kama Sutra, all of them indicating the exoticism and eroticism of the East. The sexual culture of the orient (however that got to be defined) has for centuries captivated, first, Western explorers, and afterwards, Western imperialists and visitors. The erotic allure of the East for Western men is the subject of a grand history, _The East, The West, and Sex: A History of Erotic Encounters_ (Knopf) by Richard Bernstein. The author has been a foreign correspondent serving in Asia, and himself has a wife named Zhongmei Li, whom he appreciatively calls "my vision of the East". The topic, then, is close to his heart, and his book is a spectacular history of peculiarities of culture. There is some titillation here, descriptions of acts and accessibilities that cannot help but be curious and arousing, but the historical anecdotes are wonderful illustrations of general human behavior, besides often being amusing. Bernstein has described things as they have been and how things are are, with only an admirably small amount of wondering how they _ought_ to be, and certainly without any prudishness. They do sex differently "over there". This is a constant theme within Bernstein's book, and the source of the special erotic fascination men have for North and East Africa and Asia. The West had a generally Christian morality, promoting monogamy and often stressing the sinfulness of sexual fun even within marriage. In many Eastern cultures, sex was not tightly linked to love or sin. It was often assumed that men, especially powerful men, naturally would enjoy sexual favors from many women, and that desires were to be satisfied, possibly by a particular class of women. Trained sexual masseurs, courtesans, harem girls, and legal prostitutes all come under Bernstein's broad definition of harem culture. The pattern has continued to modern times. Lt. Col. John Paul Vann was an advisor to the South Vietnamese Army in the 1960s. He had a wife in the States, two girlfriends in separate households in Saigon, and countless bar girls now and then. American servicemen didn't usually have his resources, but all of them knew places to get serviced. Many Vietnam veterans are involved in what Bernstein calls "the latest phase of the long erotic adventure of the West into the East," living in Thailand for warm weather, cheap living, good food, the companionship of fellow vets (they even have official Veterans of Foreign Wars chapters), and of course the accessible women. "Do the arithmetic," one of the vets tells us. "She's 51 years younger than me. Do you think I could have somebody like her in Pennsylvania?" Bernstein is scrupulous in his understanding that a degree of sexual oppression comes from invading forces, whether commercial or military. He cannot escape that his subject matter forces him to write about powerful and eager males and compliant, often commercial females, so the subject is ri

A fascinating book that kept me engrossed. I wish the author would have elaborated on how Asian harem culture influenced how Asian cultures warred within their own realm... for example, the atrocious sexual crimes practiced by the Japanese during their repeated attempts to conquer China (i.e. Nanking). Of course, this is a personal desire that should not detract from such an excellent book. Conversational in tone, impressive in historical scope, and stunningly easy to read. The author comes across as authoratitive and likable.