Nancy Friday, better known for her writings on female sexual fantasies, turns her attention to the opposite sex in Men in Love. A notice in her last book garnered about three thousand responses from American men, of which about two hundred are included in this volume. Written in 1980, the language may be a bit dated, but not the subject matter. Rather than merely an unfiltered compilation of letters detailing male sexual fantasies, Friday synthesizes them around a given theme--say, oral sex or sadomasochism--into an explanation of how they arise and what they signify. Her approach is heavily psychoanalytic, relying on the primal conflicts the young boy faces in early life with mother and father for its explanatory power. One always wonders if the letters printed were selected to fit her theory, or the latter arose to describe the data. Whether you agree with her methodology or thesis--fantasies are triumph of love over rage--Men in Love is engaging, eye-opening reading, and not only for its sexual content.

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Excellant read

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