In the long, sordid history of male ejaculate, the late ’90s was a watershed era. We had a nationally televised conversation about our president’s semen stain and what it all meant. Seinfeld aired an episode about Kramer’s sperm count. “How many sperm do I need?” he asked. “A lot,” Elaine assured him. By the time the hair scene in There’s Something About Mary rolled around, such a gag had become pedestrian.

It’s difficult to believe what a recent phenomenon all this openness about sperm is, a phenomenon Lisa Jean Moore explores in her new book, Sperm Counts. Moore traces the history of sperm up to this climactic point in history, where banks scrub it clean it before selling it for cash, women drink it from shot glasses on DVD and the FBI uses it to send men to jail. — Will Doig

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