Three years after the English-speaking world was rocked by the publication of the best-selling manual The Joy of Sex, the freedom-loving French were rewarded by their own version of a how-to sex book in the form of Les joies de la chair (Pleasures of the Flesh). An altogether less accomplished production – the text, the illustrations and the cheap paperback format are all second-rate – it was nevertheless a welcome arrival in the few bookshops which deigned to sell it.

The author of the text, one Professeur Josef Birnbaum, is conspicuously absent from the biographical annals, suggesting that the learned professor is almost certainly a pseudonym, probably a catch-all for an editorial team put together by the publishers, France Sud. The credits give the editor of Les joies as André Guerber, who also compiled Encyclopédie illustrée: la sexologie de A à Z, and the artistic director as Monique Tissot, who went on to create a series of popular cookery books.

But it is the illustrations for which many would have bought Les joies, more than fifty of them created by ‘James’, who may quite probably be the artist, designer and magician James Hodges (1928–2019), who also illustrated magic and dance publications. Working under the semi-pseudonym is probably a blessing, since apart from their pioneering depiction of sexual activity, including full frontal genitals, they are not of the highest artistic quality. The print quality does them little justice, the double-page spreads disappearing into the binding, sometimes cutting off vital portions of anatomy.

Interestingly the book includes a fair amount of lesbian activity, but no homosexuality, and of course all those involved are young, white, and beautiful. Nevertheless, James’s drawings will remind French libertarians of a certain age what sex looked like in the heady days of the mid-1970s.

We are grateful to Dan for suggesting the inclusion of these illustrations.