Karlen, a freelance journalist and magazine editor, states that the purpose of his book is to bring together the two sexual revolutions, the social and the scientific, 'by focusing on homosexuality as a case in point'. He has produced a highly readable and fascinating report on the history of sex. The book traces the major changes in attitude toward homosexuality and other perversions from the cradle of culture in the eastern Mediterranean, through ancient Greece and Rome, into the Dark Ages, the Renaissance, and up to the present time. It is an ambitious project and, for the most part, it comes off beautifully. While not attempting to equate its scientific merit with Zilboorg's masterpiece on the history of psychiatry, I feel that it can be compared to it in terms of its own theme. Zilboorg,