Is a small paperback book published 1986 and written by an Alan Williams and Maggie Noach, which purports to be a compendium of, well, things that are facts, and things that are disgusting. I don't know about the former, but it's pretty got the latter part nailed down. You know how there used to be coffee table books back in the day, which were large in format and designed for people to leaf through admiring nice art or photography with guests? Well, this is kind of the opposite of those. It's, if anything, a toilet book. Designed to be leafed through while on the thunder box. It's certainly where I keep my copy. And what. It's better than doomscrolling both physically and psychologically as an aide to defecation.
It is disgusting indeed. In fact, that pretentious writer and alleged sex pest Neil Gaiman claims to own a copy and says that it's the one book people always return to him punctiliously. According to Wikipedia though, so that's probably made up.
The book starts with the entry on Acne (see Zits) and ends on Zits (see Acne). On the way you will discover such things as the discovery of the nature of dental plaque in the 17th century - its discoverer called it "a little white matter as thick as 'twere batter" - and ways in which corpses are disposed of around the world and what happens to them in each way. There is also an entry on obesity which refers to the world's fattest man of all time, a man named Daniel Lambert who died in 1809 weighing 335 kg. It is kind of a judgement on modern society that this record has been verifiably broken multiple times since the book was published, but that's a whole other writeup. Also you will be pleased to know that Victorian rivers were so polluted with turds that when Queen Victoria visited Cambridge and asked the Master of one of the colleges what the bits of toilet paper floating down the river Cam were, he said that they were "notices that bathing is forbidden." And then there's a recount of how crucifixion specifically kills you, and how the Great Train Robbery was solved in party by one of the perpetrator's "fartleberries."
Okay. So yes. It's disgusting. But how factual is it? On the one hand, citations are not provided, but on the other hand, that doesn't automatically make them false. Well, I did some quick and dirty fact checking of my own on a handful of the claims recited in the book. Under "Penis" is an account of how the very suave, very debonair actor David Niven suffered from a frozen todger while filming The Pink Panther and had to unfreeze it by dangling it in a glass of brandy in the hotel bar. This, I believe, is on the balance of probabilities true. It was attested to in David Niven's own autobiography and other accounts of the production of said film. Under "Oral Sex" is reference to how a certain British publishing magnate was asked about how he enjoyed the company of women half his age so frequently, and his reply was to claim that "I am the Nijinsky of cunnilingus." This also is likely true. That quote was associated to Lord Weidenfeld, co-founder of Weidenfeld & Nicholson publishing house, from several sources. Whether he could munch carpet like a racehorse is unknown, though. And under "Masturbation" there are stories about a man who had a ketchup bottle in his arse that he totally slipped and fell on and a gearstick from a Morris Minor being retrieved from a lady's foof. These are also true. Surgery magazine had an article in 1986 about vaginal and rectal foreign bodies and both these items were included as being things so retrieved.
Other items in the book, though? Not so convinced.
Possibly the most infamous entry in the book is under "Sootikin" and one of these (WARNING WARNING NSFW) is described as a mouse-shaped accumulation of hair, dirt, bodily fluids, and grease that accumulates in the vulvas of women with poor hygiene standards over time and eventually becomes so large that it falls out, and that once one was found under Queen Anne's pew at St Paul's Cathedral. This is completely made up. Every reference to it is traceable back to this book. Also vulvas do not work that way. Also also a "sooterkin" is a mouse-like creature from Dutch folklore that has nothing to do with genitalia. I'm also not convinced about the war correspondent from an unnamed newspaper who travelled the world having sex with prostitutes to collect different strains of gonorrhoea. I just don't buy it. I also don't by the origin of the phrase "giving someone the bum's rush" as being a man who, after being thrown over by his model girlfriend who was also sleeping with a certain London Gangster on the side, had an attack of diarrhoea and wiped his nipsy on her very white poodle. The mind boggles at the logistics of such an action.
In all, I would estimate it is around 75% truthful, and 25% the sort of thing that I'd write here for my LieQuest 2024 entry.
There are a bunch of other such books, such as The Vile File which came out a number of years later. I also have a copy of that. It's not very good and is in fact mostly made up. It also seems to be the source of several persistent online rumours such as the world record for the furthest distance a load of semen was ejaculated. Well, I can't find any reference to it before then, anyhow.
I recommend it though. Despite the gruesome and dubious nature of its contents, it is actually pretty funny and has that sort of slightly affable older academic's tone that you don't really see any more. Worth getting a copy of to be honest.
(IN24/10)