Alex Comfort
Alex Comfort was a British physician, author, and pacifist, born in 1920 in London. He graduated from Cambridge University, earning multiple degrees, including a bachelor's in surgery and a Ph.D. in biochemistry. Comfort's medical career began in the mid-1940s, during which he held various roles, including a lecturer on physiology and a research fellow in gerontology. He is perhaps best known for his groundbreaking 1972 book, *The Joy of Sex*, which was one of the first best-selling guides to sexuality. His literary contributions also include novels that explore themes of pacifism, historical fiction, and allegorical science fiction. Throughout his career, Comfort received several prestigious awards for his work in gerontology and literature. He passed away in 2000 after suffering from strokes. Comfort's legacy includes his influence on both medical and sexual education, as well as his advocacy for peace and anti-militarism.
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Subject Terms
Alex Comfort
Medical Professional
- Born: February 10, 1920
- Birthplace: London, England
- Died: March 26, 2000
- Place of death: Banbury, Oxfordshire, England
Biography
Alexander Comfort was born in 1920 in London, England, the son of Alexander Charles and Daisy Elizabeth Comfort. He graduated from Cambridge University with a bachelor of arts in 1943. A year later, he received a bachelor of surgery, and in 1945 he received his master’s degree. He went on to receive many other medical-related degrees, including a Ph.D. in biochemistry.
Comfort, a pacifist, was strongly opposed to World War II. He described himself as, “an aggressive anti- militarist,” and said his pacifism was based, “solely upon the historical theory of anarchism.”
He began his medical career as a house physician for the London Hospital in 1944. From 1944 to 1945, he was a resident medical officer at the Royal Waterloo Hospital in London, and for the next six years, he lectured on physiology at the London Hospital Medical College. During the rest of his life he was a research fellow in gerontology, a director of the Medical Research Council Group on Aging, a clinical lecturer in psychiatry, a psychiatrist, and a professor.
Although he wrote several books, including novels, collections of poetry, and nonfiction works, Comfort may be best known for The Joy of Sex: A Cordon Bleu Guide to Lovemaking, one of the first best-selling books about sex, published in 1972. In The Nature of Human Nature, published in 1966, Comfort postulates how evolution occurred from sociological, psychological, and anthropological viewpoints.
Comfort’s novels include No Such Liberty, a story about pacifism published in 1941. Imperial Patient: The Memoirs of Nero’s Doctor, a novel published in 1987, is set in the Roman Empire, focusing on the eccentric Roman emperor Nero. Another of Comfort’s novels, Tetrarch, is an allegorical science-fiction tale about a utopian society coerced to battle over the technological troubles of another planet.
Comfort was awarded the Ciba Foundation Prize for his work in gerontology in 1958 and the Karger Memorial Prize in Gerontology in 1969. He also won the second prize in the Borestone Poetry Award Competition in 1962. He died on March 26, 2000, at a nursing home in Banbury, Oxfordshire, England, after a series of strokes.