Ever since men and women discovered that sex was much more than procreation and that they could have a good time, various gnomes have been busy documenting various aspects of a particular sexual life. This was given a further boost when he discovered that sex could be had in a variety of positions rather than the conventional ones and that the earth did not stop turning if one had sex in the reverse plow position. This brings us to the Kama Sutra, one of the oldest sexual manuals in the world.

The Kama Sutra is attributed to the scholar Mallanaga Vatsayana (300 BC to 400 AD), and the book is a compendium of how to lead a cultured and aesthetic way of life. It is only the second chapter dealing with intercourse and positions. Repressive ideas about sex in the West were released from their shackles through freely available translations of the Kama Sutra, the Ananga Ranga (11th century AD), The Perfumed Garden of Sheikh Omar Ibn Muhammad al Nafzawi, The Secret of the Cabinet, The Mines of the Courtesans and other books such as the Tales of the Genji.

But if you were under the impression that the books taught you to bring a woman to the zenith of sexual ecstasy, then you would be sadly mistaken. They freed men and women to accept that sex was a joyous part of life.

One in five men are clueless about sex and from what I have come to learn from my casebook is that they, the man and the woman, grope, grope and then bump into each other and very soon the stork brings the baby home. Or the man goes like an unguided missile when he visits the local courtesan. It’s not as simple as that.

Generations of men around the world are told that they have to be able to perform and this pressure increases when the man marries. Most men manage to pass the test, but there is a fairly large number who fail it. This is where books come in handy, as they help a man and a woman develop confidence in each other and in themselves.

The softer side of sex and intercourse can be developed through Ovid’s Love Songs, Sappho’s Poems, and the Song of Songs, for example. There are several very old Sanskrit poems on love like this one from Bilhana: Even now;/ The pleasant intimacy of rough love;/ On the patient glory of its form;/ I am haunted by the memory; And her bright dress; / Like yellow flame, which her white hand; / Shamefully catches in her rising haste; / The slender grace of her feet that recede from her.

These are sex books like hard porn that brutalizes sex but erotic poetry that inflames the senses in the most extraordinary way and thus paves the way for a better and fuller sex life.