does!' from many personal interviews. TVs, he says, are "likely to be normally oriented sexually or not interested in sex at all; it is the least harmful of major diversions from the norm simply because of its non- sexual connotation." Most TVs, he says, would like to go out but few do because of the dangers. The situation is well summed up by one of his contacts: "I've got two lovely evening dresses, one bought and one made by my wife for me. I put one on, make myself up really well, fix my hair carefully, add long gloves, jewels and a splendid cape-and then what? Sit and watch television!"

And also, he adds, there is the transsexualist, "whose condition is part mental, part physical” and “has been perhaps overpublicized because they represent a particularly dazzling achievement of modern surgery" though not particularly common. The stage impersonator may be a drag queen, a TV, a TS, a bisexual or none of these; "The assumption of out- ward sexual characteristics by no means implies the equal assumption of that sex's functions or desires." He also mentions a curious manifestation I do not recall seeing in print before-the power of uniforms and disguises as erotic stimuli for both the wearer and the beholder. This release of in- hibitions through costume affects both the TV and the actor, leading the former into over-confidence and the latter to a more vital performance. And so to work on the real subject, in Part II, an exhaustive study (magnificently illustrated) of the history of drag in the theater. He deals mainly with the British stage, but makes a game effort to cover Europe, with occasional snap-views of the Greek, Chinese and Japanese antiquities. At least 40 pages are devoted to the boy-actresses of the Shakespearean period, with much attention to an interesting question-just how were these boys regarded by the audience? He arrives at the very credible con- clusion (opposite to that of many other historians) that the audience accepted their portrayal with the same "suspension of disbelief" that the viewer or reader applies to other strange situations. Certainly the Eliza- bethans would have been more shaken by the idea of a real girl on stage than that of accepting a boy-actress. Shakespeare expected a lot from his boys, and apparently got it; the passions of Cleopatra or Lady Macbeth were not written to be mocked! Even the frequent reversals were a tribute to the boy's powers; imagine YOU trying to present yourself as a girl impersonating a boy. The same acceptance seems to have been ex- tended to the "castrati" singers, whose voices and figures were quite ade- quate to sustain the illusion. But, when the girl-actresses began to take over around 1700, the tolerance of the English for the castrati began to wear thin, and by 1787 people were outraged by the final appearance of "Italian eunuchs" at the opera.

.....

Since then it has been essentially a different game, and the imperson-

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