Adam's Navel: A Natural and Cultural History of the Human Form by Michael Sims; Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach - review by Thomas Hodgkinson

Thomas Hodgkinson

Body Double

Adam's Navel: A Natural and Cultural History of the Human Form

By

Allen Lane The Penguin Press 336pp £12.99

Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

By

Viking 303pp £14.99
 

THE MORE I read, the less I seem to know; and the less, moreover, the scientific establishment seems to know about matters one might have thought had been sorted out years ago. Neurologists, however brilliant, stdl lack a clear understanding of the worlungs of the human brain, while the purpose served by dreaming continues to elude the investigations of even the most focused of hypnologists. Breasts are another example. Men have invented a thousand names for them, but no one has yet come up with a definitive answer to the question of what, exactly, they are for.

A woman's milk fountains - or 'dairies', as they have sometimes also been known - of course contain her mammary glands, which produce milk for the nourishment of young, but it will be noticed that our primate cousins sport sandbags considerably smaller than our own. Why, then, the special build-up

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