The Illustrated Kama Sutra

THE ILLUSTRATED ANANGA-RANGA - PERFUMED GARDEN Sexual frankness - without a hint of guilt or prurience - is the great legacy which the Eastern, and in particular Indian, traditions have given us. Here, for the first time, Sir Richard Burton's translations of the classic Eastern love texts have been published in one volume, illustrated in colour with a dazzling and unique collection of Indian painting and sculpture. This is not a book for prudes: it is intended for open-minded adults who are interested to learn what other cultures can teach them about a very important aspect of human life. The idea that something as natural as sex could be shameful in any way would have been incomprehensible to Vatsyayana, the old sage who wrote Kama Sutra as a religious duty nearly 2,000 years ago. These are not 'sex manuals' in the modern sense - clinical collections of coital postures - the intention is broader and much more humane. Kalyana Malla wrote his Ananga-Ranga with the worthy intention of preventing 'separation of the married pair': Burton's collaborator F.F. Arbuthnot was also concerned with 'matrimonial happiness' and criticised 'the folly of husbands not knowing how to woo their wives delicately'. If the Arab writer Sheikh Nefzawi was a little less pious in intention, he can be forgiven for the poetry and humour in his Perfumed Garden.