The 93-year-old director James Ivory is the Ivory of Merchant Ivory, the ne plus ultra of literary filmmakers. One thing I did not expect to find in his memoirs was quite so much talk about penises, and by “quite so much” I mean “any.” If those are your expectations, they will be gratified often and early.
On page 9, Ivory recalls a time when he was seven and playing with a little boy named Eddy inside a playhouse made by Ivory’s father from a Victorian piano case. “One day Eddy and I were in there, trying out putting our penises into each other’s mouths,” he writes. “I don’t know whose idea that was but I made clear that Eddy’s dick must not touch my lips or tongue, nor the inside of my mouth. I had learned all about germs at school by then. Eddy went first, and I can still exactly see him doing it. I can also remember his acrid odor as he carried out my instructions and I took charge, guiding his little white wormlike penis myself.”
