The New Yorker has an excellent review of “The Playmate Book: Six Decades of Centerfolds“. Like most New Yorker reviews, there is a brief discussion of the book and then a long and winding road into the context from which it comes. Joan Acocella examines the background and later works of the various centerfolds, the history of Playboy, and the unchanging nature of Hugh Hefner.
“That, in the end, is the most striking thing about Playboy’s centerfolds: how old-fashioned they seem. This whole “bachelor” world, with the brandy snifters and the attractive guest arriving for the night: did it ever exist? Yes, as a fantasy. Now, however, it is the property of homosexuals. (A more modern-looking avatar of the Playmates’ pneumatic breasts is Robert Mapplethorpe’s Mr. 10 ½.) Today, if you try to present yourself as a suave middle-aged bachelor, people will assume you’re gay. But though times have changed, Hefner hasn’t.”
Yours truly,
Mr. X
…si non oscillas, noli tintinnare…
