pleasure. Yalom discusses the use of wet nurses, although physicians and priests encouraged the woman to breastfeed. One French physician in the mid-1500s encouraged breastfeeding because of its sexual pleasure for both mother and child.
Although the noblewomen of Western Europe were leaving breastfeeding to peasant women, the women in the Netherlands continued to nurse their own children, as researched in chapter three. Famous painters showed the scene of domestic tranquility centering around the lactating woman throughout the seventeenth century, as in de Hoock's Woman Nursing and Infant, with a Child and Moreelse's Sophie Hedwig. The breast was also considered a symbol of love, as evidenced by Rembrandt's The Jewish Bride.
Chapter four propels the reader into modern times with the breast portrayed as a political instrument. Breastfeeding women were feeding the nation, especially in famine-ridden and revolutionary France. The last words of La Bas (a political deputy against Robespierre) to his wife were encouragement to continue to breastfeed-for nourishment and to instill love for his country in the child. Also in the eighteenth century in France, women had to nurse their infants to receive state support. Moving into American politics, the book relates that Sojourner Truth discussed her ability as a wet nurse for the nation and bared her breasts in a speech to white males. The author traces the impact of the breast and breastfeeding throughout the World Wars both in the United States and abroad.
The other chapters cover the breast in terms of its psychological impact, how it became commercialized (along with the development of the corset and bra), and back into the political realm with liberation and women's rights. The author explores deeply the breast in its diseased state. Her accounts of women's literature outlining mastectomies done only under the sedation of a single glass of wine are vivid and painful. She discusses augmentation and reduction surgeries and the court battles with the manufacturers of silicone implants.
This book is well written and extremely well researched. Students of history or art will find this book a wonderful adjunct to their studies. The midwife will be able to use this book in the exploration of feminist theory. In addition, the midwifery student may find answers to breastfeeding questions/dilemmas that plague American society: breastfeeding in public, social acceptance of baring the breast, and sexuality and breastfeeding. The experienced midwife will find this book thought provoking and often reflective of midwifery's path in the modern world. Yalom explores the breast through almost every medium possible giving the reader a provocative view of the breast throughout Western history. Only infrequently does her strong feminism cause bias. To show how a part of the anatomy has influenced the culture of humankind through the centuries is a difficult task-a task that Marilyn Yalom has done superbly.