Singular Pleasures

By Harry Mathews

Book Overview

A "cool, humorous, and affectionate" book of vignettes about a practice both universal and universally taboo: masturbation.

In sixty-one vignettes, Harry Mathews records the imaginative varieties of this solitary activity in prose that is playful, intimate, urgent, quirky, and humane. The soloists range in age from nine to eighty; the locales from Australia to Zaire; the means of masturbation from the commonplace to the bizarre. The young man in Gaza with his hair dryers, the woman in Manila with her cello bow, the long-eared bat, the charioteer, the candelabra--this swirl of unlikely individuals and objects is brought together in such a way that it floods a world born fresh once more.

"There is nothing pornographic, in the strict sense, about Mathews' text, since it does not seek to arouse the reader," wrote John Ash for Artforum. "His intention is to leave us deeply impressed by the ingenuity, tenacity, and inventiveness with which humans in all places and at all ages have pursued their own pleasure. He succeeds completely."In this light-hearted collection, Mathews underscores the essential generosity of an apparently scandalous enterprise, where in the act of making love with ourselves we throw our imaginations open to a union with anything the universe itself has fended and fostered into being. The book is illustrated throughout with watercolors by Francesco Clemente that offer an intriguing counterpoint to Mathews's fictions.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1628976470
• ISBN13: 9781628976472
• Release Date: June 2026
• Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press
• Length: 150 Pages

Customer Reviews

A series of fetes for the one thing besides death...

...that unites us all. The sheer breadth of fantasy, mechanical aids and passive witness employed in these 61 tableux is staggering: hysterical, sad, inventive, invective, or finally just so blatantly quotidian you suddenly find yourself acknowledging your habituated pleasures in a similar light.If you don't feel the need for the illustrations (I personally prefer it without), the complete text of "Singular Pleasures" is included in the Mathews prose anthology "The Way Home" published by the ever-trustworthy Atlas Press.

Brilliant realization of high concept

The concept, as I read it, is that most of us are bound by a common secret--masturbation--and that the lengths we go to in order to achieve release are what makes us distinct from each other as individuals--our imaginations. To prove it, Mathews, one of America's best unkowns, has written 61 vignettes of people of all ages and nationalities doing whatever it takes to express themselves. For example: "A man of thirty-five is about to experience orgasm in one of the better condominiums in Gaza. He is masturbating, but neither hand nor object touches his taut penis: arranged in a circle, five hairblowers direct their streams of warm air toward that focal point. He has plugged his ears with wax balls." Not all the vignettes are as funny; some are sad, some are touching, some make you tilt your head to one side, hoping for understanding; hoping in vain.