The Complete Kama Sutra

The world's oldest and most widely read guide to the pleasures and techniques of sex, the Kama Sutra was compiled in the fourth century A.D. by a Brahmin and religious scholar named Vatsyayana, who worked from texts dating back to the fourth century B.C. Until the present, the only English translation of this Hindu love classic was that of the famous English explorer Sir Richard Burton, published in 1883. Unlike Burton's version, Alain Danielou's new translation preserves the numbered verse divisions of the original and includes two essential commentaries: the Jayamangala commentary, written in Sanskrit by Yashodhara during the Middle Ages, and a modern Hindi commentary by Devadatta Shastri. Whereas Burton's Victorian reluctance to translate certain terms obscured our understanding of the philosophy and techniques of theKama Sutra, Danielou has preserved the full explicitness of the original, dealing with everything from the art of scratching to relations with the wives of others.