Doctor of Love: James Graham and His Celestial Bed Book

Widely accepted as the world's first sex therapist, Dr. James Graham was devoted to the research of the effect of physical stimuli on the psyche, and more specifically on sexual activity. It was this that led him to invent his infamous Celestial Bed, a contraption akin to a torture rack, yet built with the intent to impart exquisite sexual pleasure rather than excruciating physical pain. Medicine in the late 18th and early 19th centuries was generally more prone to inflict pain than to relieve it. Patients were bled, blistered, lanced, poked, and chopped up, all with little or no anesthesia, and it was the hurt administered by these methods which caused Graham to concern himself with the more gentle side of the profession. Unsurprisingly, such a concern was met with both outrage and controversy. Syson's biography is a truly emotive depiction of both the man himself and 19th-century society. By following him from his native Edinburgh to America and back again, Doctor of Love achieves a breadth not commonly found in biography, and renders an unforgettable portrait of a truly remarkable man.