A Beginner's Guide To The Kama Sutra, From Indian Sexuality Experts

When you hear the words "Kama Sutra," what comes to mind?

If it has something to do with acrobatic sex positions, you wouldn't be the only one. However, sex positions are just one of many varied topics discussed in the ancient Indian text known as the Kama Sutra.

The Kama Sutra is an ancient Indian treatise on living a pleasurable life. Though it''s most known for one of its sections that gives instructions on how to have better sexual experiences, the book isn't predominantly about sex. It was originally written to teach young, wealthy men how to live well, and it includes instructions on a wide variety of topics, such as how to build a house, how to find a wife, how spouses should treat each other, and much more. 

"You can actually say that it's a little bit of everything," says Varuna Srinivasan, MPH, FRSPH, a sexual health consultant and gender justice advocate. "It's a book about how to live life and appreciate the finer things."

The word kama translates to "love, desire, and pleasure," according to Srinivasan. A sutra is a specific type of Indian literature, typically written in aphorisms and meant to be instructive. Therefore, kama sutra roughly translates to "pleasure manual"—though again, it's about pleasure in the broader sense.

The Kama Sutra is thought to have been written around the year A.D. 300 by a Hindu philosopher named Vātsyāyana Mallanaga, of whom historians know very little other than his name. However, the book is actually thought to be a collection of previous texts1 that the author simply stitched together. And according to Anand, some believe that much of the book may have actually been written by women.

"He says that he took all his information from texts that were written a thousand years before, and that he's pretty much copied and pasted the bits that he likes. He says that in his introduction," Anand explains. According to Indian mythology, she says, some of those original texts are believed to have been written by the wife of the God of Love himself, Kama. Other stories suggest courtesans of the time paid for the book to be written, she says. Anand personally believes the famous section on sex (section two out of seven sections) may have been written by a woman because of the way it focuses so much on women's pleasure, which was still radical at the time of its writing.

While its authorship remains shrouded in mystery, the Kama Sutra went on to become a very important and widely disseminated text across the region that later became India. According to Anand, there have been hundreds if not thousands of versions of the Kama Sutra. "Literally every kingdom across what we call India would have their own version of this written," she explains, though she says that over time, as different cultures and different ideas of morality came into play in the region throughout history, the text gradually fell from prominence.

Then, in 1883, a British explorer named Richard Burton published a translation of the book that became massively popular across Europe and the world. "That's when it also goes askew because a lot of it is translated pretty badly," says Anand. Burton's version focused heavily on the erotic themes of the Kama Sutra and specifically the sex positions, which is where today's misunderstandings about the text stem from.

The Kama Sutra is all about pleasure at its core, says Anand, and it emphasizes the idea that sex should always feel good for both people. "It says that if sex is to be had between two people, it should always be joyous. It should be fabulous. It should be totally mutually pleasurable; otherwise, it's not worth it."

The Kama Sutra places a lot of emphasis on women's pleasure, says Anand. "It does tell women how to pleasure the man, but sort of the focus is all about how it takes much longer for a woman to come to pleasure. You've got to give her that time. You've got to kiss her like this. You've got to do this to her. So it's all about that," she explains. "If it takes her three days to come to arousal, you spend those three days."

One version of the text explains men must make sure their wife is fully pleasured for the good of his business, according to Anand. The logic goes: If your wife is pleased in her life and in the bedroom, she'll support you in your work and in all your endeavors. But if she's dissatisfied, she'll find other lovers or spend your money or otherwise make your life miserable.

Other versions compared lovemaking to the skills of a warrior, drawing connections between sex positions and battle positions.

The Kama Sutra makes it clear that penetration isn't the be-all and end-all of good sex. "That's not what pleasure is all about. It's not all about penetration," says Anand. "Sex is not just that one thing."

Anand notes that many non-penetrative activities are described in the Kama Sutra as being potential sources of pleasure. For example, she says the book tells men to keep drawing materials in their bedroom and to make portraits of their lover prior to sex, as a way to create moments of intimacy, eye contact, and one-on-one special time together. It also describes activities like juggling, using perfumes and jewelry, and specific types of kisses and "love bites" as key parts of intimacy.

"I think sex, for most people, is about that penetration, isn't it? And nothing more. And for most women, that doesn't even count as pleasurable. There's nothing exciting about that. It's like the least exciting thing," Anand says. "There are so many other things to the sexual act that should be explored."

When it comes to penis-in-vagina intercourse, the Kama Sutra teaches that size does, in fact, matter.

"It says that, if two people are going to have sex, then one of the first criteria is that the sexual organs should match in size," Anand explains. "If the woman is too tight, and the man is too big, it's gonna lead to pain. And if the woman is too large, and he's too small, there's going to be absolutely no sensation. So the idea is that the organs should be the same size."

This is actually the basis for why the Kama Sutra talks about sex positions so much in the first place, says Anand: It says that if two partners' sexual organs are not matched in terms of size, they should engage in specific positions meant to help maximize sensation and pleasure (and/or minimize any sexual pain). Those are the sex positions described in the Kama Sutra.

Although sexuality and intimacy is a big theme throughout the Kama Sutra, the point of the book was not simply to teach people how to have good sex.

The Kama Sutra offers an impressively holistic, pleasure-positive vision of sexuality for a book written nearly 2,000 years ago. But importantly, our experts stress that the book is about so much more than just sex positions. "It was just about adding refinement, elegance, variety, and keeping the passion alive," says Anand.

If you want to learn from the Kama Sutra, Srinivasan recommends finding a modern (and accurate) translation and seeking out Indian authors with expertise in the field. "If you're reading the book, try something new that you've never tried before," they add.