PLEASURE may serve a useful evolutionary purpose, but the pursuit of it can lead us far astray. , who has previously written about happiness, sleep and the effect of mind on health, begins his ambitious new book in thrall to our capacity to over-indulge, in particular the wild sexual depravities of successive Roman emperors. The book’s subtitle rather undersells it – or oversells it, depending on your point of view: it is as much about the history, culture and politics of pleasure as it is the biology, psychology and neuroscience.
This bear-hug approach to a subject can be exhausting to read, but Martin is always entertaining and his coverage of the science is comprehensive – he is especially good on the neurobiology of desire and addiction. Never short of an anecdote to oil the narrative, his two pages on masturbation injuries (involving electrical cables and uncooked spaghetti) will not easily be forgotten.
Fourth Estate