October 22, 2024 • 24 mins
Why is everyone so mistaken about this book?
'The Kama Sutra' by Vātsyāyana is a how-to guide on courtship & sexual pleasure, as opposed to a graphic explanation of sexual positions. All of this comes from an Indian context from that era (so more addressed to the educated man/woman). Split into 7 parts and is about things like sexual union, class & social status differences, acquiring a wife & pleasing her, cheating, courtesans & sexual aids.
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(00:03:00) Themes/Questions
(00:08:52) Author & Extras
(00:16:05) Summary
(00:20:55) Value 4 Value
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:00):
Why is everyone somistaken about this book?
Welcome, everyone,to another episode
of The Mere Mortals bookreviews live here
on the 23rd of October,2024 at 11:00
(00:20):
Am AustralianEastern Standard Time.
As you might surmise,this is the podcast
where I Kyrindemonstrate
tantric sex positions.
Live for you now.
Okay,I won't be doing that,
but I will be talkingabout the Kama Sutra
by Vatsyayana
And this in particular
is the Richard Burtontranslation.
Now, I should say thisbook I actually have in
(00:41):
front of me
says the Kama Sutraof Vienna
and the Phaedrus of Plato.
The unabridged texts on
two greatclassics on love.
Now I've actually donea book review, of, well,
containing the Phaedrusof Plato in the
I think It's the Trialand Death of Socrates
by Plato on this bookreviews channel.
So if you want that,go jump into that.
(01:02):
So I'm just going
to be focusing exclusivelyon the Kama Sutra today
and perhaps why it's,
not as tantric and, sexualas you might imagine.
So this book was published
in well published,created in 200 to 500 A.D.
somewhere around that timeperiod.
And the Englishtranslation
first appeared in 1883.
(01:22):
Now 170 pages in length,I'd say it took seven,
4 to 5 hoursreading in total.
And as opposed to
the graphic explanationof sexual positions,
it's actually more of a
how to guide on courtshipand sexual pleasure,
which was a rather,you know what?
I'm going to I'm goingto do it. I'm taking off,
taking off the shirt so we
(01:43):
can have some sensual
tantric stuff going on,
at the very leastin this podcast.
So all of this comesfrom an Indian context,
from that era.
So think of, you know, the
just after Christsort of era of what,
a millennium and a halfago, something like that.
And it's more addressedto the educated Indians,
I guess, of that timeperiod.
(02:03):
So think of like the upperclass.
It's splitinto seven parts,
and it's about thingslike sexual union, class
and sort of
social status
differences, acquiringa wife and pleasing her,
cheat
and then subsequentlyhow to cheat on her
courtesans.
So this is essentiallylike prostitutes
or girlsselling sex for money
or favour or giftsor things like that,
(02:26):
and then perhapssome sexual aids
that you might need,aphrodisiacs and the like.
So there's a fairbit contained
within this book.
I will say it'snot just for men, though,
as large portions of thisare addressed to women
as you'll hear about
with the six, 64 artsof, of of the Kama Sutra.
So there's quite a fewthings to jump into here.
(02:47):
We're going to start with,
I guess, whatis actually in the book.
And before we talkabout what is not in here
and or intentionallyexcluded
changed inthe next section of this.
So there's,
a couple of things,but we'll start off
with what'sactually in the Kamasutra.
So the Kama
Sutra is a sutra which istranslated as a discourse
(03:08):
about kama, which isdesire, pleasure or love.
So relatively simple.
It's really a step
by stepguide on sexual relations
is that's probably howI would describe this
in a, in a one easyterm assessment,
80% of the book is aboutmarriage relations custom,
and probably only 20%is actually about the sex,
(03:28):
which you can findin part two.
For all of you horny
dogs out there who justwant the, the action.
So for the most part,it's, rather serious.
And we'll quite often
give out lists of thingsto do
or how to avoidcertain things
or all of the optionsthat are available,
or whycertain events can happen.
So some examples from this
(03:49):
you will learnhow to gain access
to a king's harem.Very useful.
Now, nowadays,
what sort of presents togive to the opposite sex?
How to geta girl's attention
for the first time
and, you know,
things contained withinthat going
another layer deepwould be like,
you, can, funnily enough,you can sleep with her,
her nanny's maid,
(04:11):
nanny's daughter.
And that will get, getyou attention with her.
Or you can send a servantto her and she will.
And that servantwill then,
you know,express your gifts
and your your dying love,
her undying love for herand things like this.
So it's got a little ityou can send a friend
all of thesesorts of things.
What to do
if you're dissatisfiedwith your wife
(04:31):
or how to satisfy heras well.
What you should doto please your husband.
On the oppositeend of that,
and also thingsjust random stuff,
like why would a womanreject you?
So if you've got,
an overture for her,why would you reject you?
And funnily enough, it'skind of the same things
as nowadays.
You dirtyyour smelly, you're poor,
you're not good looking.
She already has a lover,etc., etc., etc.
(04:53):
so you will
find these sectionswhere it just goes on.
Here's onethat I just random
to openly, the signsto a manner of a woman
manifesting herlove of these.
She calls out to a man
without being addressedby him.
In the first instance,
she shows herself to himin secret places.
She speaks to himcharmingly and
inarticulate,articulately.
That'sa that's good for me.
(05:14):
I was I'm inarticulate.
On these book reviews.
She has the fingersof her hand
and the toes of her feet
moistenedwith perspiration,
and her faceblooming with delight.
And then there's anothersix here that I can't,
with such thingsas shampooing her body.
If she's overcomeby fatigue,
more stuff about shampoo.
And lastly,when she resisted
all the efforts of the manto gain her over,
(05:35):
and she returned to him
next day to shampoohis body as before,
it's a lot of shampooinggoing on
in here, so it's ratherextensive and covers
quite a fewsocial situations.
Things like,
okay, this
your manin this situation,
this is whatyou should maybe do
to get this woman'sattention.
This is how a manshould behave to his wife.
(05:55):
So it is rather it'srather broad.
I would say.
But this is forprobably most of the book.
But as you're reading it,
you're going to encountersome silly
and funny thingsat the same time.
Whether this is because
it's Indian sillinessor it's just old
writing sillinessor even just talking about
(06:16):
sex can be kind of funnyand silly.
But, there's a small listthat I've created,
and this is notexhaustive.
Believe that there's waymore in this book.
So it's permissible to lay
with a married womanso I can kill her husband
and obtain his vastriches, which I covet.
So that is moraland legal.
Well, maybe not legal,but it's definitely moral
(06:37):
in the Kamasutrathat I can do that.
If I'm having troubles
with a girl or wanting toconvince her family,
one of your friendsshould pose an astrologer
to convince your futurewife's family
that you're luckyand blessed. Not too bad.
That's actually oneI might steal.
A man puts his linkshim into a Johnny
to make Congress.
So I'lllink Sam is, obviously a,
(07:00):
a word for dick.
Yoni is,
has a vagina, and Congressis where you, is
the act of inserting,I guess,
because you can also have
math Congresswhere you put your links
into her mouth.
So my partner.
So this is,very applicable for me.
Being single
should be healthy,but not have sweaty hands.
Come from a good family,
but with a namethat does not end with RL.
(07:23):
Go to watch outfor those carols.
And be of gooddisposition,
but not have a nostrilturned up.
Interesting.
One way I could helpmy cause is to make myself
invisible by using burntfruit and snake eyes.
Crashed into a powderor smoked, I believe,
and then rub thatinto my own eyes.
(07:44):
So I will be doing thatshortly.
And visiting a woman'sbathroom.
Let's hope it goes well.
And then I've got,
the classic betel leavesand betel nut,
the ultimate aphrodisiac.
And honestly, it canbe used for everything.
Betel is probably the word
that is used most in this,
not, in this book,because you do everything
with these leavesand nuts.
(08:05):
You know,you go to coffee,
you have some betterleaves. Nuts.
You want to make herhorny,
give her some betterleaves and nuts.
You want to give a giftto her?
You better believeyou're going
to give her better leavesand nuts.
And, onewhich kind of shocked me
a little bit was a wayto gain your love.
It is to. In her presence.
By the way,
lay a child on your lap,kiss them on the mouth,
and transfer
(08:26):
the aforementionedbetel leaves
and nuts into their ownmouth.
Apparently,that turns girls on.
And, is a wayto gain your lover,
so you definitely dohave some rather random
and interesting thingswithin this book.
Once again,it's it's mostly serious.
Those things are not told
in a joking way,but you're going
to encounter them and go,
(08:46):
okay,that's rather strange.
And I made that liston my phone
because it was ratherstrange.
So, I'm goingto jump into, I guess, the
additionalstuff here, which
is okay, what was thisbook not about?
Why do I think people aremistaken about this book?
And also,
you know,
extra details
about the authorsand perhaps some
translation issuesthat occurred.
(09:07):
So we almost have
two authorsfor this book here.
The original is VarshaYana.
I believe that's, that'sYana, something like that.
Very difficult to pin downmuch about him.
The KamaSutra is the only thing
I believehe's really renowned for.
And this was writtenin Sanskrit
and is
probably more ofa conventional compendium
(09:28):
rather than original
authorship, becausehe does make note of other
rules related textin this book of saying,
you know, this personbelieves,
it's it's possible toor it's a
you should do thiscourse of action.
I would just saylike a man should,
give gifts to a woman,
but another one saysyou shouldn't
give to a giftto a woman in
(09:49):
this particular situation.
So it doesseems like he's he's
kind of drawing uponother people's things.
He was an Indianphilosopher,
from what we gather,
who lived in the secondor sixth century A.D.
or C.E. and common era.
So we've got the, the,the original Indian
who wrote this.
But, you know, thiswas a long, long time ago.
(10:10):
Hard to really knowwho wrote this.
Anything about them.
Then there is the
translation into English,
and we have, RichardBurton to thank for this,
who was a 19th centuryEnglish explorer,
one of those guys
who came fromlike a, I'd say like
a, probably apretty wealthy background
and then was like,I want to see the world.
And so
just travelled in a time
when seeing the worldwas very difficult.
(10:31):
So in the 18 8870s, aroundthat area, there are,
he spoke quitea few languages himself.
He was the original personto find these.
And apparently he cameacross one of these,
Sanskrit manuscriptsand it was like,
I want to knowmore about this.
Commissionedanother Indian
who spoke English in,
(10:53):
obviously,I guess the Hindu or the
Sanskrit language or.
I'm not sure
if you speak it Sanskritor if you just read it.
But any case, he got himto translate that.
And from what I gather,the book is somewhat
neutered in termsof the translation style.
And the translationsare difficult
because you've got literaltranslations.
(11:15):
You've got oneswhich try and keep
more in thethe flow of what
the author was intendingof what
it would have been readlike in that time.
You've got translationswhere you have to,
change things up becausethe style of grammar
is so different from whatit was in the past.
This translations, which,
you know,
probablydon't even make much sense
(11:36):
because it was originally
meant to be read
rather like read aloudto a group of people
rather than readinternally in your head
all sorts of things likethis, from what I gather,
this one sufferedfrom the curse of
being translated in the,
you know,end of the 19th century.
And Richard Burtonbrought this back
to England, published itthere under a, a separate
(11:56):
publishing houseto get around some of the,
the legal laws around,
what what'sit called, you know,
when when thingsare too explicit,
when it's kind of naughty,it's like, oh my God, it
treating subjectswhich shouldn't be treated
upon and not talked about
in polite society,etc., etc..
So it's it's kind of weirdbecause I believe
there's some things
which, for example,the translation of link,
(12:19):
Sam and Johnny
is not really accurate,and it kind of gives
a distorted perspectiveof what the,
what they were actuallytalking about in terms of,
like the penis
and the vagina and,and actually making love,
and probably some of the
very explicit stuffstill got
a little bit neutered.
(12:39):
But it was still
outrageousfor the Victorian era.
And so,
yeah,kind of give given props
and take away propsat the same time. So how
translatableis this nowadays?
You know,I've got this translation.
I'm sure there'sanother one out there,
probablymultiple others out there.
We're just kind ofto go with this
for the moment and say
(12:59):
like, okay, it'sgood enough.
I get the general vibe ofwhat this book is about.
It's not a doubt.
Another translation
is really goingto have affected
my reading from thisand what I gain from this.
And so
I never haveexplained just yet
why is everyone mistaken
about this bookand what is the mistake?
Well, I don't if anyone islike me and please,
(13:20):
you know, boost inright into the show.
Leave me a comment
if this is differentfor you,
but I always assumethe Kama Sutra
was explicitlyabout how to have sex
and the different waysof giving pleasure
to someone.
So I was expecting a bookjust full about,
differentsexual positions.
How to excite Your Love.
(13:41):
Perhaps the typesof things you
would say to excite them,
different types or and
even including you know,massages and masturbation.
I was expecting that,you know, man
on, man, gay love,lesbians, orgies.
Oh, that's essentiallywhat I was expecting.
And perhaps even diagramsand stuff like that.
(14:03):
And as far as I'm aware,everyone else believes
that's whatthis book is about.
Tell me if I'm wrong in
that what this book
was actually aboutwas not that.
And it's not aguide of them.
It's rather just courtshipand pleasure in general.
So there's no pictures,
there'sminimal instructions.
That part two I mentioned
(14:23):
does mention some sort ofthings like it.
It vaguely hintsat having anal sex and,
talks about,
the different typesof vagina
as a woman can have,whether it's,
small, big or large.
And he uses I think it'slike, hair, a deer and,
an elephant.
In terms of size.
(14:44):
And then there's threesizes for the man as well,
and that you need to havelike a good mix
of, like, a large penisand a large vagina.
Or it could get weird.
And if the woman's got
a large vaginaand a small penis.
Yeah, it's like not goingto work out, etc., etc..
So there's bitsand pieces,
but honestly,not that much.
So you're not goingto learn
(15:04):
about the actual act
of sex, masturbation,or pleasure giving.
The other thing with this
was there'smultiple texts,
of this Sanskrit.
And so it was not only isthat was it a companion
from that time, but,
you know,even in the 19th century,
trying to
collate all of theseseparate texts
and put them into oneKama Sutra?
(15:26):
Because there wasmultiple of them
all around was a difficultthing in of itself.
And so
that as well as the
non-literal translation
as well as the general
mystique of sexor Congress,
I think all goesto explaining why
this book is mistakenlyonly about sex.
Perhaps if we haddifferent social morals,
(15:48):
perhaps of sex was stillnot a taboo topic in some.
It's certainly not talked
about as as widelyas sports, for example,
or anything like that.
Then perhaps there wouldbe, I wouldn't have been
mistaken on what this bookwas actually about.
So jumpinginto my summary,
similar books,recommendations,
contextis everything for this.
(16:09):
It strikes me reallyas a book for a young guy
who knowsnothing of the female sex.
Didn't get the birdsand bees talk
in this, you know, Indianera of the late,
well, just off to cross,
200 to 500 BCE.
I do something like that
and yet finds himselfthrust into marriage
(16:30):
because that iswhat was happening
a lot back in that time.
And there stillis arranged marriages.
And in India to this day.
So in this case,a guide on how to kiss,
what to doafter the wedding,
how to talk to a family,where to put his links.
These are all obvious
questions, yetwith unknown answers.
So I think for the
context of the time,
the book would have
(16:50):
probably been very,very useful
and made a lot of sense.
But in the modern context,it's rather out of place
and honestly would not
translate into our worldvery well.
The only real valueI took from
this was a small peepinto what ancient India
might have been like,and the types of,
behavioursthat was going on around
(17:11):
then, or social moralsand things like that.
And I was there
ruts rather surprisedthat it wasn't only male
dominant,
only aboutthe male perspective,
but it did alsotalk about,
you know,females can do this.
And it did have, I don'tknow, but not in parents.
Not the right word.
But there was a lot
of autonomyand independence
(17:32):
and seem like for womenin India at that time,
how accurate that is.
You know,I'd need to read more of
a history book, probably.
But I did get the feelingthat, you know,
a woman could choose, oh,I want to marry this man
or I want to marrythat man.
Marriage for love was,
maybe
not acceptable, butwas practised, perhaps.
(17:53):
And, there certainly wasnot as many social taboos.
If this book and themanuscript and the,
and the translations, allthis stuff has survived
this long,
I doubt it would have beensomething which was,
you know,
not not used
or practised or learnedabout in, in many cases.
(18:14):
So the 64 partsof the Kamasutra,
for example,
which is basically justa list of all the things
that a womanshould know how to do.
I've got some of them uphere.
So, she should knowhow to,
do stage playing, tyingturbans, manual skills,
magic, sorcery, dancing,
singing, playing a musicalinstrument, cooking,
(18:34):
culinary skills, masteringtongue twisters skills.
Up. Martial arts,carpentry, architecture,
gardening,the art of cockfighting.
Teaching parentsor starlings to talk.
Applying perfumeskills on sports
and games, making imageswith clay,
making artificial flowers,etc., etc.
quite a few things.
You know, if,
if girl could doten of them
(18:54):
nowadays,I would be impressed.
I would go, damn.
Like she'sgot some skills,
she's worked hard and,
you know,improved herself and,
it that itwas, it was kind of funny
reading that and be like,yeah, you know what?
If a girl had all 64
of these things, like,I'd be smitten.
That would work on me.
So, overall,
I'm going to have to
(19:14):
give the book a two
and a half out of ten.Like, honestly,
the reading of it wasn'tthat fun.
I was mistaken inwhat I was, going to get.
I actually read thisbecause, on this channel
a long time ago,probably a year or plus,
someone actually asked meto review the Kamasutra.
And so it'sjust been sitting in my,
in my to read listfor a long time,
(19:36):
so I can't remember thethat person's name.
But thank you for,
for recommendingand asking me to do it.
I've read this bookso that you don't have to.
I'm not sure there's much
to be valuedand gained from this.
It was rather boring.
It was rather boring.
If you want a similar bookrecommendation,
it's like a child'sversion of the Tripitaka.
(19:56):
So if you don't know what
the true Whitaker
is, it'sone of the kind of
like fundamental Buddhisttexts.
Long, long, long, long,long book,
or series of booksabout a lot of it's
mostly related to monasticpractices.
How monks behave.
But there'ssome general stuff
about general Buddhismand the Buddha himself.
(20:16):
I tried reading thisa couple of years ago.
There's randomand hilarious
things thrown in,
but it's mostly boringand monotonous repetition.
A monk should do this.
A monk should not do that.
Rather outdated advice.
That and customs
that don'treally apply to nowadays.
If you want to knowmore about this, look up.
The monksjust want to have sex
with monkeys and YouTube
(20:38):
and find the Me and Modelsepisode on that.
It's a good laugh.
I watched it again,
today or yesterdayin practice for,
in preparationfor this. And
it's pretty funny
about some of the things
that, one and I weretalking about in there.
So, enjoy that.
It's,it's a it's a good rule.
So let's jump
on to the value for valuesection here.
(20:59):
I would absolutely loveif you could have,
to share this bookwith someone,
share this book reviewwith someone who perhaps
wants to know moreabout the Kama Sutra and
and perhapshas the mistaken
impressionthat it's all about sex
and the positioningand making love.
So, sharingthat with someone
I would loveto have more book
recommendationslike that person gave me.
(21:21):
So, you know,reaching out to us via
any of the social mediachannels,
probably the best would beon Twitter or,
jumping into our discord.
I don't use the Instagramso much nowadays,
but one wouldprobably see it
if youif you message there.
And then you can also helpsupport us financially.
There's a PayPal link downbelow.
(21:42):
But you could also do
a, what wecall a is a booster gram,
which is where you sendsupport in directly via
a podcasting app,
because this is a podcast
that you can findon the app.
So if you don't wantjust the YouTube version,
you can actually jumpinto, one of those.
And there is a way ofsupporting us there.
Miyamoto'spodcast.com/support.
(22:05):
And let's jumponto the last section.
Here I am live.
I just saw Carlos Arriola,
appearing in the chatsays it
definitelyhas a reputation.
Yeah, yeah, I feel likeit's not just me who was,
under the impression,
the false impressionthat this book was about
tantric sexand the positions
(22:26):
and lovemakingwhich it definitely isn't.
It's.
I mean, it'sgot a tiny portion
section of that, but, it'scertainly not enough to,
arouse theimagination of, like, oh.
Why is everyone somistaken about this book?
Welcome, everyone,to another episode
of The Mere Mortals bookreviews live here
on the 23rd of October,2024 at 11:00
(00:20):
Am AustralianEastern Standard Time.
As you might surmise,this is the podcast
where I Kyrindemonstrate
tantric sex positions.
Live for you now.
Okay,I won't be doing that,
but I will be talkingabout the Kama Sutra
by Vatsyayana
And this in particular
is the Richard Burtontranslation.
Now, I should say thisbook I actually have in
(00:41):
front of me
says the Kama Sutraof Vienna
and the Phaedrus of Plato.
The unabridged texts on
two greatclassics on love.
Now I've actually donea book review, of, well,
containing the Phaedrusof Plato in the
I think It's the Trialand Death of Socrates
by Plato on this bookreviews channel.
So if you want that,go jump into that.
(01:02):
So I'm just going
to be focusing exclusivelyon the Kama Sutra today
and perhaps why it's,
not as tantric and, sexualas you might imagine.
So this book was published
in well published,created in 200 to 500 A.D.
somewhere around that timeperiod.
And the Englishtranslation
first appeared in 1883.
(01:22):
Now 170 pages in length,I'd say it took seven,
4 to 5 hoursreading in total.
And as opposed to
the graphic explanationof sexual positions,
it's actually more of a
how to guide on courtshipand sexual pleasure,
which was a rather,you know what?
I'm going to I'm goingto do it. I'm taking off,
taking off the shirt so we
(01:43):
can have some sensual
tantric stuff going on,
at the very leastin this podcast.
So all of this comesfrom an Indian context,
from that era.
So think of, you know, the
just after Christsort of era of what,
a millennium and a halfago, something like that.
And it's more addressedto the educated Indians,
I guess, of that timeperiod.
(02:03):
So think of like the upperclass.
It's splitinto seven parts,
and it's about thingslike sexual union, class
and sort of
social status
differences, acquiringa wife and pleasing her,
cheat
and then subsequentlyhow to cheat on her
courtesans.
So this is essentiallylike prostitutes
or girlsselling sex for money
or favour or giftsor things like that,
(02:26):
and then perhapssome sexual aids
that you might need,aphrodisiacs and the like.
So there's a fairbit contained
within this book.
I will say it'snot just for men, though,
as large portions of thisare addressed to women
as you'll hear about
with the six, 64 artsof, of of the Kama Sutra.
So there's quite a fewthings to jump into here.
(02:47):
We're going to start with,
I guess, whatis actually in the book.
And before we talkabout what is not in here
and or intentionallyexcluded
changed inthe next section of this.
So there's,
a couple of things,but we'll start off
with what'sactually in the Kamasutra.
So the Kama
Sutra is a sutra which istranslated as a discourse
(03:08):
about kama, which isdesire, pleasure or love.
So relatively simple.
It's really a step
by stepguide on sexual relations
is that's probably howI would describe this
in a, in a one easyterm assessment,
80% of the book is aboutmarriage relations custom,
and probably only 20%is actually about the sex,
(03:28):
which you can findin part two.
For all of you horny
dogs out there who justwant the, the action.
So for the most part,it's, rather serious.
And we'll quite often
give out lists of thingsto do
or how to avoidcertain things
or all of the optionsthat are available,
or whycertain events can happen.
So some examples from this
(03:49):
you will learnhow to gain access
to a king's harem.Very useful.
Now, nowadays,
what sort of presents togive to the opposite sex?
How to geta girl's attention
for the first time
and, you know,
things contained withinthat going
another layer deepwould be like,
you, can, funnily enough,you can sleep with her,
her nanny's maid,
(04:11):
nanny's daughter.
And that will get, getyou attention with her.
Or you can send a servantto her and she will.
And that servantwill then,
you know,express your gifts
and your your dying love,
her undying love for herand things like this.
So it's got a little ityou can send a friend
all of thesesorts of things.
What to do
if you're dissatisfiedwith your wife
(04:31):
or how to satisfy heras well.
What you should doto please your husband.
On the oppositeend of that,
and also thingsjust random stuff,
like why would a womanreject you?
So if you've got,
an overture for her,why would you reject you?
And funnily enough, it'skind of the same things
as nowadays.
You dirtyyour smelly, you're poor,
you're not good looking.
She already has a lover,etc., etc., etc.
(04:53):
so you will
find these sectionswhere it just goes on.
Here's onethat I just random
to openly, the signsto a manner of a woman
manifesting herlove of these.
She calls out to a man
without being addressedby him.
In the first instance,
she shows herself to himin secret places.
She speaks to himcharmingly and
inarticulate,articulately.
That'sa that's good for me.
(05:14):
I was I'm inarticulate.
On these book reviews.
She has the fingersof her hand
and the toes of her feet
moistenedwith perspiration,
and her faceblooming with delight.
And then there's anothersix here that I can't,
with such thingsas shampooing her body.
If she's overcomeby fatigue,
more stuff about shampoo.
And lastly,when she resisted
all the efforts of the manto gain her over,
(05:35):
and she returned to him
next day to shampoohis body as before,
it's a lot of shampooinggoing on
in here, so it's ratherextensive and covers
quite a fewsocial situations.
Things like,
okay, this
your manin this situation,
this is whatyou should maybe do
to get this woman'sattention.
This is how a manshould behave to his wife.
(05:55):
So it is rather it'srather broad.
I would say.
But this is forprobably most of the book.
But as you're reading it,
you're going to encountersome silly
and funny thingsat the same time.
Whether this is because
it's Indian sillinessor it's just old
writing sillinessor even just talking about
(06:16):
sex can be kind of funnyand silly.
But, there's a small listthat I've created,
and this is notexhaustive.
Believe that there's waymore in this book.
So it's permissible to lay
with a married womanso I can kill her husband
and obtain his vastriches, which I covet.
So that is moraland legal.
Well, maybe not legal,but it's definitely moral
(06:37):
in the Kamasutrathat I can do that.
If I'm having troubles
with a girl or wanting toconvince her family,
one of your friendsshould pose an astrologer
to convince your futurewife's family
that you're luckyand blessed. Not too bad.
That's actually oneI might steal.
A man puts his linkshim into a Johnny
to make Congress.
So I'lllink Sam is, obviously a,
(07:00):
a word for dick.
Yoni is,
has a vagina, and Congressis where you, is
the act of inserting,I guess,
because you can also have
math Congresswhere you put your links
into her mouth.
So my partner.
So this is,very applicable for me.
Being single
should be healthy,but not have sweaty hands.
Come from a good family,
but with a namethat does not end with RL.
(07:23):
Go to watch outfor those carols.
And be of gooddisposition,
but not have a nostrilturned up.
Interesting.
One way I could helpmy cause is to make myself
invisible by using burntfruit and snake eyes.
Crashed into a powderor smoked, I believe,
and then rub thatinto my own eyes.
(07:44):
So I will be doing thatshortly.
And visiting a woman'sbathroom.
Let's hope it goes well.
And then I've got,
the classic betel leavesand betel nut,
the ultimate aphrodisiac.
And honestly, it canbe used for everything.
Betel is probably the word
that is used most in this,
not, in this book,because you do everything
with these leavesand nuts.
(08:05):
You know,you go to coffee,
you have some betterleaves. Nuts.
You want to make herhorny,
give her some betterleaves and nuts.
You want to give a giftto her?
You better believeyou're going
to give her better leavesand nuts.
And, onewhich kind of shocked me
a little bit was a wayto gain your love.
It is to. In her presence.
By the way,
lay a child on your lap,kiss them on the mouth,
and transfer
(08:26):
the aforementionedbetel leaves
and nuts into their ownmouth.
Apparently,that turns girls on.
And, is a wayto gain your lover,
so you definitely dohave some rather random
and interesting thingswithin this book.
Once again,it's it's mostly serious.
Those things are not told
in a joking way,but you're going
to encounter them and go,
(08:46):
okay,that's rather strange.
And I made that liston my phone
because it was ratherstrange.
So, I'm goingto jump into, I guess, the
additionalstuff here, which
is okay, what was thisbook not about?
Why do I think people aremistaken about this book?
And also,
you know,
extra details
about the authorsand perhaps some
translation issuesthat occurred.
(09:07):
So we almost have
two authorsfor this book here.
The original is VarshaYana.
I believe that's, that'sYana, something like that.
Very difficult to pin downmuch about him.
The KamaSutra is the only thing
I believehe's really renowned for.
And this was writtenin Sanskrit
and is
probably more ofa conventional compendium
(09:28):
rather than original
authorship, becausehe does make note of other
rules related textin this book of saying,
you know, this personbelieves,
it's it's possible toor it's a
you should do thiscourse of action.
I would just saylike a man should,
give gifts to a woman,
but another one saysyou shouldn't
give to a giftto a woman in
(09:49):
this particular situation.
So it doesseems like he's he's
kind of drawing uponother people's things.
He was an Indianphilosopher,
from what we gather,
who lived in the secondor sixth century A.D.
or C.E. and common era.
So we've got the, the,the original Indian
who wrote this.
But, you know, thiswas a long, long time ago.
(10:10):
Hard to really knowwho wrote this.
Anything about them.
Then there is the
translation into English,
and we have, RichardBurton to thank for this,
who was a 19th centuryEnglish explorer,
one of those guys
who came fromlike a, I'd say like
a, probably apretty wealthy background
and then was like,I want to see the world.
And so
just travelled in a time
when seeing the worldwas very difficult.
(10:31):
So in the 18 8870s, aroundthat area, there are,
he spoke quitea few languages himself.
He was the original personto find these.
And apparently he cameacross one of these,
Sanskrit manuscriptsand it was like,
I want to knowmore about this.
Commissionedanother Indian
who spoke English in,
(10:53):
obviously,I guess the Hindu or the
Sanskrit language or.
I'm not sure
if you speak it Sanskritor if you just read it.
But any case, he got himto translate that.
And from what I gather,the book is somewhat
neutered in termsof the translation style.
And the translationsare difficult
because you've got literaltranslations.
(11:15):
You've got oneswhich try and keep
more in thethe flow of what
the author was intendingof what
it would have been readlike in that time.
You've got translationswhere you have to,
change things up becausethe style of grammar
is so different from whatit was in the past.
This translations, which,
you know,
probablydon't even make much sense
(11:36):
because it was originally
meant to be read
rather like read aloudto a group of people
rather than readinternally in your head
all sorts of things likethis, from what I gather,
this one sufferedfrom the curse of
being translated in the,
you know,end of the 19th century.
And Richard Burtonbrought this back
to England, published itthere under a, a separate
(11:56):
publishing houseto get around some of the,
the legal laws around,
what what'sit called, you know,
when when thingsare too explicit,
when it's kind of naughty,it's like, oh my God, it
treating subjectswhich shouldn't be treated
upon and not talked about
in polite society,etc., etc..
So it's it's kind of weirdbecause I believe
there's some things
which, for example,the translation of link,
(12:19):
Sam and Johnny
is not really accurate,and it kind of gives
a distorted perspectiveof what the,
what they were actuallytalking about in terms of,
like the penis
and the vagina and,and actually making love,
and probably some of the
very explicit stuffstill got
a little bit neutered.
(12:39):
But it was still
outrageousfor the Victorian era.
And so,
yeah,kind of give given props
and take away propsat the same time. So how
translatableis this nowadays?
You know,I've got this translation.
I'm sure there'sanother one out there,
probablymultiple others out there.
We're just kind ofto go with this
for the moment and say
(12:59):
like, okay, it'sgood enough.
I get the general vibe ofwhat this book is about.
It's not a doubt.
Another translation
is really goingto have affected
my reading from thisand what I gain from this.
And so
I never haveexplained just yet
why is everyone mistaken
about this bookand what is the mistake?
Well, I don't if anyone islike me and please,
(13:20):
you know, boost inright into the show.
Leave me a comment
if this is differentfor you,
but I always assumethe Kama Sutra
was explicitlyabout how to have sex
and the different waysof giving pleasure
to someone.
So I was expecting a bookjust full about,
differentsexual positions.
How to excite Your Love.
(13:41):
Perhaps the typesof things you
would say to excite them,
different types or and
even including you know,massages and masturbation.
I was expecting that,you know, man
on, man, gay love,lesbians, orgies.
Oh, that's essentiallywhat I was expecting.
And perhaps even diagramsand stuff like that.
(14:03):
And as far as I'm aware,everyone else believes
that's whatthis book is about.
Tell me if I'm wrong in
that what this book
was actually aboutwas not that.
And it's not aguide of them.
It's rather just courtshipand pleasure in general.
So there's no pictures,
there'sminimal instructions.
That part two I mentioned
(14:23):
does mention some sort ofthings like it.
It vaguely hintsat having anal sex and,
talks about,
the different typesof vagina
as a woman can have,whether it's,
small, big or large.
And he uses I think it'slike, hair, a deer and,
an elephant.
In terms of size.
(14:44):
And then there's threesizes for the man as well,
and that you need to havelike a good mix
of, like, a large penisand a large vagina.
Or it could get weird.
And if the woman's got
a large vaginaand a small penis.
Yeah, it's like not goingto work out, etc., etc..
So there's bitsand pieces,
but honestly,not that much.
So you're not goingto learn
(15:04):
about the actual act
of sex, masturbation,or pleasure giving.
The other thing with this
was there'smultiple texts,
of this Sanskrit.
And so it was not only isthat was it a companion
from that time, but,
you know,even in the 19th century,
trying to
collate all of theseseparate texts
and put them into oneKama Sutra?
(15:26):
Because there wasmultiple of them
all around was a difficultthing in of itself.
And so
that as well as the
non-literal translation
as well as the general
mystique of sexor Congress,
I think all goesto explaining why
this book is mistakenlyonly about sex.
Perhaps if we haddifferent social morals,
(15:48):
perhaps of sex was stillnot a taboo topic in some.
It's certainly not talked
about as as widelyas sports, for example,
or anything like that.
Then perhaps there wouldbe, I wouldn't have been
mistaken on what this bookwas actually about.
So jumpinginto my summary,
similar books,recommendations,
contextis everything for this.
(16:09):
It strikes me reallyas a book for a young guy
who knowsnothing of the female sex.
Didn't get the birdsand bees talk
in this, you know, Indianera of the late,
well, just off to cross,
200 to 500 BCE.
I do something like that
and yet finds himselfthrust into marriage
(16:30):
because that iswhat was happening
a lot back in that time.
And there stillis arranged marriages.
And in India to this day.
So in this case,a guide on how to kiss,
what to doafter the wedding,
how to talk to a family,where to put his links.
These are all obvious
questions, yetwith unknown answers.
So I think for the
context of the time,
the book would have
(16:50):
probably been very,very useful
and made a lot of sense.
But in the modern context,it's rather out of place
and honestly would not
translate into our worldvery well.
The only real valueI took from
this was a small peepinto what ancient India
might have been like,and the types of,
behavioursthat was going on around
(17:11):
then, or social moralsand things like that.
And I was there
ruts rather surprisedthat it wasn't only male
dominant,
only aboutthe male perspective,
but it did alsotalk about,
you know,females can do this.
And it did have, I don'tknow, but not in parents.
Not the right word.
But there was a lot
of autonomyand independence
(17:32):
and seem like for womenin India at that time,
how accurate that is.
You know,I'd need to read more of
a history book, probably.
But I did get the feelingthat, you know,
a woman could choose, oh,I want to marry this man
or I want to marrythat man.
Marriage for love was,
maybe
not acceptable, butwas practised, perhaps.
(17:53):
And, there certainly wasnot as many social taboos.
If this book and themanuscript and the,
and the translations, allthis stuff has survived
this long,
I doubt it would have beensomething which was,
you know,
not not used
or practised or learnedabout in, in many cases.
(18:14):
So the 64 partsof the Kamasutra,
for example,
which is basically justa list of all the things
that a womanshould know how to do.
I've got some of them uphere.
So, she should knowhow to,
do stage playing, tyingturbans, manual skills,
magic, sorcery, dancing,
singing, playing a musicalinstrument, cooking,
(18:34):
culinary skills, masteringtongue twisters skills.
Up. Martial arts,carpentry, architecture,
gardening,the art of cockfighting.
Teaching parentsor starlings to talk.
Applying perfumeskills on sports
and games, making imageswith clay,
making artificial flowers,etc., etc.
quite a few things.
You know, if,
if girl could doten of them
(18:54):
nowadays,I would be impressed.
I would go, damn.
Like she'sgot some skills,
she's worked hard and,
you know,improved herself and,
it that itwas, it was kind of funny
reading that and be like,yeah, you know what?
If a girl had all 64
of these things, like,I'd be smitten.
That would work on me.
So, overall,
I'm going to have to
(19:14):
give the book a two
and a half out of ten.Like, honestly,
the reading of it wasn'tthat fun.
I was mistaken inwhat I was, going to get.
I actually read thisbecause, on this channel
a long time ago,probably a year or plus,
someone actually asked meto review the Kamasutra.
And so it'sjust been sitting in my,
in my to read listfor a long time,
(19:36):
so I can't remember thethat person's name.
But thank you for,
for recommendingand asking me to do it.
I've read this bookso that you don't have to.
I'm not sure there's much
to be valuedand gained from this.
It was rather boring.
It was rather boring.
If you want a similar bookrecommendation,
it's like a child'sversion of the Tripitaka.
(19:56):
So if you don't know what
the true Whitaker
is, it'sone of the kind of
like fundamental Buddhisttexts.
Long, long, long, long,long book,
or series of booksabout a lot of it's
mostly related to monasticpractices.
How monks behave.
But there'ssome general stuff
about general Buddhismand the Buddha himself.
(20:16):
I tried reading thisa couple of years ago.
There's randomand hilarious
things thrown in,
but it's mostly boringand monotonous repetition.
A monk should do this.
A monk should not do that.
Rather outdated advice.
That and customs
that don'treally apply to nowadays.
If you want to knowmore about this, look up.
The monksjust want to have sex
with monkeys and YouTube
(20:38):
and find the Me and Modelsepisode on that.
It's a good laugh.
I watched it again,
today or yesterdayin practice for,
in preparationfor this. And
it's pretty funny
about some of the things
that, one and I weretalking about in there.
So, enjoy that.
It's,it's a it's a good rule.
So let's jump
on to the value for valuesection here.
(20:59):
I would absolutely loveif you could have,
to share this bookwith someone,
share this book reviewwith someone who perhaps
wants to know moreabout the Kama Sutra and
and perhapshas the mistaken
impressionthat it's all about sex
and the positioningand making love.
So, sharingthat with someone
I would loveto have more book
recommendationslike that person gave me.
(21:21):
So, you know,reaching out to us via
any of the social mediachannels,
probably the best would beon Twitter or,
jumping into our discord.
I don't use the Instagramso much nowadays,
but one wouldprobably see it
if youif you message there.
And then you can also helpsupport us financially.
There's a PayPal link downbelow.
(21:42):
But you could also do
a, what wecall a is a booster gram,
which is where you sendsupport in directly via
a podcasting app,
because this is a podcast
that you can findon the app.
So if you don't wantjust the YouTube version,
you can actually jumpinto, one of those.
And there is a way ofsupporting us there.
Miyamoto'spodcast.com/support.
(22:05):
And let's jumponto the last section.
Here I am live.
I just saw Carlos Arriola,
appearing in the chatsays it
definitelyhas a reputation.
Yeah, yeah, I feel likeit's not just me who was,
under the impression,
the false impressionthat this book was about
tantric sexand the positions
(22:26):
and lovemakingwhich it definitely isn't.
It's.
I mean, it'sgot a tiny portion
section of that, but, it'scertainly not enough to,
arouse theimagination of, like, oh.
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