Making the Body Beautiful: A Cultural History of Aesthetic Surgery

An intriguing inquiry into how aesthetic surgery has evolved into a major area of modern medicine, this book combines cultural perspectives on the body beautiful with a medical chronology. Gilman (Creating Beauty to Cure the Soul, etc.), who teaches human biology at the University of Chicago, focuses extensively on the nose as the original site of aesthetic procedures. He simultaneously explores ""the basic motivation for aesthetic surgery--the desire to `pass,'"" starting with 16th-century surgery to rebuild the noses of syphilitics ""so they would be less visible in their society""--and its cultural implications. Early debate centered on whether surgery restored function or merely catered to human vanity. The ""hierarchy of races"" created by some scientists in the 18th century inspired procedures to create ""American noses out of Irish pug noses,"" while ""the origin of the `correction' of the black nose is masked within medical literature [because] no reputable surgeon wanted to be seen as facilitating crossing the color bar."" Gilman discusses political uses of aesthetic surgery, such as that of the Nazis to achieve the Aryan ideal, the transformation of former Klan Grand Wizard David Duke into what one commentator called ""a blond, blow-dried replica of a young Robert Redford,"" transsexual surgery to permit ""restoration of the relationship between the inner and outer selves"" and aesthetic surgery as a fountain of youth. His fast-paced narrative blends cultural criticism with discussion of medical techniques and ethics in a thoughtful study that should appeal to both a lay and professional readership. Photos not seen by PW. (May)