What is sex? In response to this seemingly simple question, the Lacanian perspective makes the answer a much more complex affair. Alenka Zupančič's book approaches the question from exactly this perspective, addressing sexuality as a purely philosophical problem of psychoanalysis, both Freudian and Lacanian.

"Right now I'm not having sex, I'm talking to you. Well, yes! I feel exactly the same satisfaction I would feel if I were having sex." This is the example Lacan offers to support the claim that sublimation is a satisfaction of the drive without repression. How is the concept of sublimation conventionally defined? It is a substitute satisfaction in place of the absent sexual satisfaction. But what if, as Lacan claims, we can derive exactly the same satisfaction from speech that we draw from sex (or writing, painting, prayer, or other activities)? The essence is not to explain the satisfaction we derive from speech by referring to its sexual origin, but to understand that the satisfaction we derive from speech is sexual in itself.

The satisfaction drawn from speech contains a key to sexual satisfaction (and not the reverse) – even a key to sexuality itself and its inherent contradictions.

"Zupančič's book is breathtaking. It is a groundbreaking revelation of the philosophical wager at the heart of the psychoanalytic project. Zupančič confronts us for the first time with the ontological significance of sex." Todd McGowan, University of Vermont.

"Zupančič performs an admirable feat here; with the clarity and precision that characterize her, she restores the playful ambiguity and enigmatic logic of sex, assigning to sexuality the ontological grandeur it deserves. Her book constitutes a publishing event." Joan Copjec, Brown University.

"Freud said that there is something radically unsatisfying at the core of sexuality. What is sex? is undoubtedly one of the most satisfying analyses we have ever read about this 'something'." Eric L. Santner, University of Chicago.