Book

Corien van Zweden

Breasts

A Biography

An accessible and enlightening narrative-led investigation of this intimate body part

When the doctors tell Corien van Zweden, after a recurrence of cancer, that her left breast will need to be removed, she is startled by their presumption that an immediate ‘reconstruction’ is what she wants, or indeed needs. With more questions than answers, she resolves to understand her breasts on a biological level, but also to recognize what they mean to her, to other women and to society as a whole.

In this investigative biography, Van Zweden leads readers through the many transformations breasts undergo as well as their shifting roles from the day a girl first notices her nipples changing, to what one third of women will later face — breast cancer, and then to the changes brought about by menopause. The only body part that we are not born with, the breast’s unique ability to transform itself on a cellular level tragically makes it more susceptible to cancer. Roughly a quarter of all tumours occur in the breasts; numbers which are only increasing in the western world.

Though told primarily through the window of her own experiences, Breasts offers a mosaic of women’s testimonies, detailing their relationship with their breasts, be it one of apathy, obsession, joy, sadness, pride or disgust. These multiple and complex feelings are often dictated by generational and cultural divides. How are women’s attitudes to their bodies affected by a society in which today’s teenagers are literally bombarded with hundreds of thousands of images to compare themselves with? The market for enlargement and reduction surgeries grows in leaps and bounds each year.

Van Zweden expands on these experiences at each of the breast’s three life stages — growth, blossoming and decline — and dives into the current debates, including why women have breasts (that they attract men is a disputed theory), how to weigh up the benefits of breastfeeding against the (environmental) toxins present in breast milk, and the psychology of prosthetics. We meet plastic surgeons, sexologists, porn stars, philosophers and lactation experts as Van Zweden consults the latest scientific research and delves into history to trace changes in the ways we experience breasts — big and small, hidden or revealed — and their indisputable role in femininity.

The story of the breast is not just the story of the woman who has them, but the story of those who behold them and who judge them, and the professionals who concern themselves with them. At the end of the book, Van Zweden poignantly reveals why she finally decides not to have her breast replaced.

That Breasts has something melancholic about it, turns out to be Van Zweden’s greatest merit. Because that is how we withdraw the female body from the sexualized gaze: by sometimes letting things also be sad.

De Groene Amsterdammer

Van Zweden undertakes a more than worthy attempt to clear up a large part of our ignorance about breasts.

HUMO

An enlightening book that every woman should read.

Zin

Corien van Zweden

Corien van Zweden studied theology and history and is a journalist and writer. She writes about health and has published several books, such as Breasts: The Life of an Intimate Body Part. It has been translated into Finnish and Polish and was nominated for the prize for the best journalistic book…

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Details

Borsten. De levensloop van een intiem lichaamsdeel (2019). Non-fiction, 285 pages.

English sample available

Sample translation

English (PDF document)

Publisher

De Bezige Bij

Van Miereveldstraat 1
NL - 1071 DW Amsterdam
Netherlands
Tel: +31 20 305 98 10
Fax: +31 20 305 98 24

E-mail:
[email protected]
Website:
http://www.debezigebij.nl

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Literary agent

Marianne Schönbach Literary Agency

Rokin 44 III
1012 KV Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Tel: +31 20 620 00 20
E-mail:
[email protected]
Website:
http://www.schonbach.nl

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