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When The Birds And The Bees Were Not Enough Analysis

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In both of Mary E. Fissell’s works, The Marketplace of Print and When the Birds and the Bees Were Not Enough, she discusses the circulation of medical books and their influence on the printing press, economics, and society’s view on household medical practices. While the former discusses medical books as a whole with divisions between authors and types of books, the latter focuses on a specific medical book - a sex manual - titled Aristotle’s Masterpiece.
Fissell’s chapter in The Marketplace of Print heavily emphasizes the statistical evidence surrounding the circulation of vernacular medical books during the mid 1600s and 1700s, supported by textual sources from that time period explaining the influence of these books on English society as …show more content…

The book captivated many people of all audiences, but the interest in such a subject remained unclear; despite scarce educational opportunities on sexual topics, rural farm life often educated the younger public on “the birds and the bees.” Still, the book’s publication rates rose dramatically, through piracy, revision, and unregulated production. However, the title of the manual remains unusual considering its content, but Fissell explains that Aristotle was considered an expert on sex during his time and allusions to Aristotle in previous sex manuals served as the inspiration (and an innuendo) for all written sexual content. The book did not solely focus on sexual relations, but also on pregnancy, childbirth, and infant health, appealing to an older audience and not only curious teens. Fissell educates the reader that authors composed Aristotle’s Masterpiece in vernacular and prose so that all audiences and families could easily access this conventionally upheld manual. Despite the decline in popularity in the twentieth century, Fissell highlights the lasting influence of this novel on standard curiosity, relationships with friends, content in literary pieces, and experiences with childbirth thorough accounts from teenage boys and girls, adults, and even

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