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The present widespread and popular method of skin pigmentation by puncture is presented in an interesting and amusing book. The author discusses not only the history and art of tattooing in the United States but also its underlying psychological connotations. Throughout, emphasis is laid upon the inherent sexual significance of the process of tattooing and of the tattooed emblem itself. The relationship of the various sexual components is discussed with illustrative clinical material.
It is of interest to note the general recognition of the close association between sex and tattooing—as evidenced by the attitude of men who consider that their wives or mistresses have had previous sexual experience when they find that they have been tattooed. Several court decisions in cases of rape and seduction are quoted wherein acquiescence by the woman is assumed because she has previously been tattooed.
There is a striking similarity in the emotional reactions of young men and women to their first tattooing and their initial sexual experience. The analogy felt between tattooing and seduction is clearly shown in two letters quoted; one, from a young girl about to be tattooed to a famous tattooed woman of the circus inquiring: "Were you sorry, Mrs. Stevens? … Anything you may see fit to write me about your own feeling after you get tattooed will be very much appreciated". The expressions used by another tattooed girl might equally well apply to a previous seduction:—"I was tattooed for love and live to regret it. Heaven may forgive the man who so swayed my youthful heart as to cause me to submit to his fiendish treatment but I cannot". To the young boy also his first tattoo often symbolizes his sexual initiation to which he reacts with great pride as a proof that he has become a man, or with shame, fear and disgust.
The symbolism of the act of tattooing is pointed out as obvious: the needle as the penis introducing the tattooing fluid into a cavity;