Abstract
The Viennese psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing represents a defining point in the medical classification of modern sexual types. Harry Oosterhuis has written a richly documented and imaginative study based on a vast collection of case records. Krafft-Ebing's hallmark was the detailed, individual case history, as he moved away from practice in an asylum to confront sexual deviance throughout society. His clientele approached him as a tolerant and understanding sounding board. Oosterhuis focuses on Krafft-Ebing's sympathetic interactions with homosexuals and sadomasochists. Most of the patients were male, and yet many fantasies deal with feminine identities, or being tormented by or tormenting women. In an illuminating quantitative analysis, we learn that all sadists were male, 47 of the 50 masochists were male, and 143 men and 25 women had "contrary sexual feeling" (p. 153). We also learn that these are "superior degenerates" (p. 152). Oosterhuis provides four tables on social position, patient status, and diagnoses. [End Page 203]
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