| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 106.3

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| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 106.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Comparative/World

James C. Whorton. Inner Hygiene: Constipation and the Pursuit of Health in Modern Society. New York: Oxford University Press. 2000. Pp. xvii, 315.

It takes a certain amount of courage to write a monograph about constipation. While the bowels and their health have been a topic of investigation and a source of income for physicians, pharmaceutical companies, and hucksters for centuries, investigating "inner hygiene" will surely bring on occasionally witty remarks and snickering, both from colleagues and from the public at large. From the sophomoric humor of "Benny Hill" to the academically acceptable scatological wit of the Canterbury Tales, excrement and its discontents have been a rich source for the comedian. 1

Fortunately, James C. Whorton, author of Crusaders for Fitness: A History of American Health Reformers (1982), was undaunted. Clearly written and carefully researched, his new book makes a substantial scholarly contribution both to the history of constipation and related ills and to the cultural history of England and the United States. Readers will learn how the medical profession's pronouncements and popular opinion about food and waste—and about human diseases in general—were sometimes congruent and sometimes at odds. Whorton carefully presents the ideas of now-discredited theorists with the dignity they merit, but he is nonetheless appropriately judgmental. . . .

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