Rent Boys: A History from Ancient Times to the Present

Personal gift

It's unlike me to have not checked out the existing reviews before buying a book, often as not I take them as mere advice rather than gospel, but the universal condemnation of this book is startling... though totally justified. So poorly written and composed; my 2 year old nephew might have come up with better. There is no obvious source material cited and most of the information in the book is ancient speculation or pure hyperbole.Having studied ancient history at university and having been a passionate Romanist since then I imagined this book would be an aid to broadening my knowledge of the whole of the Roman world; recently studies of slavery, women in society and sexuality within the Roman male community have done just that. This book is no help at all – I am in fact sure I could write a better one on the subject myself!Avoid it like an Antoine Plague…

An interesting read

All I can say about this is that Michael Horne seems to have collected lots of amusing and salacious stories from the gay past and is now recycling them around again and again in different formats. Ifyou have read one you have probably read them all. And all though the stories may be amusing and interesting the research is flawed and some of the writing down right pedestrain and the titles are misleading - in no way can this be described as a hstory from ancient times to now - he hasn't even consulted - if we are to believe his bibiography - some of the most relevant books and research on male prostitution. A big disapointment and major waste of money.

Well researched book, good for reference.

boring

If it was worth the money to return this I probably would. The bibliography gives away the poor quality by startlingly referencing "Wikipedia: Research today is impossible without the aid of this monument." Now in my fourth year of academic study I can safely say that research today is impossible WITH the aid of Wikipedia and it should never be treated as gospel. The text itself isn't referenced so no idea where most of his sources have been drawn from or how credible his statements are. Also the language used throughout is basic and in places crude; it reads like a Wikipedia article. Given the texts in the bibliography are so numerous I can only imagine the author has at most skim read the introductions to get names and dates as he hasn't paid attention to the details some of them contain. Overall I would recommend avoiding this edition there are much better resources available that provide depth and factual accuracy on the subject of male prostitution.

EXCELLENT

love books on history

En primer lloc, un llibre recomanable per a qualsevol lector interessat en la literatura o assaig de gènere i, més ne concret, sobre una visió històrica de la homosexualitat. També l'he qualificat alt per que termini d'entrega va estar el previst, sense cap demora innecessària. Pel que respecta a l'edició, una edició correcta ai amb lletra llegidora.

Rent boys through history. That is a subject of interest to me. This book has good background and discussion. It is not high scholarship, but it is decent scholarship. I appreciate that and have learned a fair amount. If you are good with self publishing, or the price, go for it.

Dry & poorly written. LONG winding sentences. Lots of "Minutia" Disappointing.

In recent years there have been a number of books dealing with the history of male prostitution/rent boys, although most have tended to be country/city specific. Minichiello and Scott (eds) "Male Sex Work and Society"; Morrison and Whitehead (eds) "Male Sex Work" or Donald J West "Male Prostitution" to name but a few general studies. Robert McNamara "The Times Square Hustler"; Barry Reay "New York Hustlers" or Jeremy Reed "The Dilly - a Secret History of Piccadilly Rent Boys" to name a few city-specific. The n there have been almost endless books by male sex-workers themselves: Rick Whitaker; Michael Dorais; Aaron Lawrence; Christopher Daniels - right back to Grant Tracy Saxon's "The Happy Hustler" (1975). Michael Hone's "Rent Boys" purports to be a world history of the phenomenon. It's nothing of the sort. His failure to understand the purport of classics like K.J.Dover's "Greek Homosexuality" or Craig Williams' "Roman Homosexuality" (both cited in the bibliography)ends up with a mish-mash of half truths and misunderstandings about the classical era and its reduction to a few lurid stories about psychopaths like Elagabalus. There are some clearly erroneous assertions - such as "Shakespeare's actors often doubled as rent boys for extra cash" - complete nonsense and not a shred of evidence to support it (p.104) Similarly gossip about modern stars like Tab Hunter which confuse his various love affairs with rent boy activity are puerile and not worthy of consideration. Lucian (125-180AD) was not an "Assyrian" (p.123) - he was born in Asia Minor (Turkey) and so it goes on. This is a book of titillating vignettes strung together without analysis or meaning and certainly not worthy of the title "history" if that word still has any intellectual weight or meaning.