cover image Original Skin: Exploring the Marvels of the Human Hide

Original Skin: Exploring the Marvels of the Human Hide

Maryrose Cuskelly. Counterpoint (PGW, dist.), $15.95 trade paper (288p) ISBN 978-1-58243-739-2

An omnibus of meandering essays on human epidermis takes Australian journalist Cuskelly through reflections on touch, tattooing, fingerprinting, and organ donation, among other themes. Cuskelly delves into skin color and new theories about reproduction that better explain why dark-skinned populations tended to be near the equator and light-skinned ones in the north. (Moreover, women have lighter skin tones than men in all racial groups in order to absorb more vitamin D when pregnant and breastfeeding.) Moles, aging, and blushing garner their own treatment, as well as a host of ghastly skin diseases from leprosy to melanoma. Most unnerving is Cuskelly's look at different cultural practices of flaying, such as depicted in Herodotus and Ovid and, later, its grisly apotheosis in the Nazi lampshades made of human skin. There's a good deal of humor ("Facial tattoos, for example, will most likely ensure that you have a seat to yourself on public transport") though such nuggets as "peering into the abyss" of severe burn injuries reveals startling information that elevates this lightweight title above an engaging magazine article. (July)