Meet Shere Hite the feminist hero whose notorious work revolutionised how we think about sex, marriage, and the female orgasm… Despite being one of the leading thinkers of the second wave feminist movement, today Shere Hite is little known, little written about, and, unsurprisingly, little read. Her groundbreaking book, The Hite Report, was the first feminist exploration of the link between sex and male power. It sold millions of copies when first published in 1976 and revolutionised the way people thought about marriage and the female orgasm. How, then, did it, and Hite, disappear from public consciousness? Australian historian Rosa Campbell combines original research and sharp cultural analysis to explore the complicated life and literary legacy of Shere Hite. Expanding on her ideas about sex namely, that sex is sexist the book explores Hite’s fraught childhood, struggles working in the porn industry, and eventual cancellation by the far-right Evangelical movement. All the while, Campbell holds Hite and The Hite Report to account for their own failings and absence of intersectionality. In a post-MeToo world, with the far-right on the march globally, The Book that Taught the World to Orgasm and then Disappeared’s examination of shifting ideological movements is essential to understanding both the current feminist movement, as well as how conservative and reactionary efforts can silence even the most successful of women.
