Playboy's Book of Forbidden Words was first published in 1972 by Playboy Press and distributed by Simon & Schuster. Written by Robert Anton Wilson

Robert Anton Wilson

Robert Anton Wilson , known to friends as "Bob", was an American author and polymath who became at various times a novelist, philosopher, psychologist, essayist, editor, playwright, poet, futurist, civil libertarian and self-described agnostic mystic...

, it is sub-titled 'A liberated dictionary of improper English, containing over 700 uninhibited definitions of erotic

Erotica

Erotica are works of art, including literature, photography, film, sculpture and painting, that deal substantively with erotically stimulating or sexually arousing descriptions...

 and scatological

Scatology

In medicine and biology, scatology or coprology is the study of feces.Scatological studies allow one to determine a wide range of biological information about a creature, including its diet , healthiness, and diseases such as tapeworms. The word derives from the Greek σκώρ In medicine and biology,...

 terms'. The paperback edition's cover featured Mercy Rooney. It is a collection of 'items' from "Abbess" to "Zoophilia Erotica".

Interviewed by "Common Ground

Common Ground

Common Ground may refer to:* Common ground * Grounding in communication * The commons, publicly owned areas, especially those for meeting* Common land, ground where the public have traditional rights, such as grazing...

", Vancouver (July 1999 Issue), Wilson talked about how he'd been tinkering with Playboy's Book of Forbidden Words, which he considered his best book—worst, that is, after the editors at Playboy did to the book "what the Roman Army did to the Sabine women

The Rape of the Sabine Women

The Rape of the Sabine Women is an episode in the legendary history of Rome in which the first generation of Roman men acquired wives for themselves from the neighboring Sabine families. The English word "rape" is a conventional translation of Latin raptio, which in this context means "abduction"...

". Claiming ignorance and inexperience, he hadn't objected at the time. If he had later rewritten the book the way he had wanted it to be the first time, he would have called it Robert Anton Wilson's Book of Black Magick and Curses. He aimed to include all the anthropological

Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...

 and neurolinguistic

Neuro-linguistic programming

Neuro-linguistic programming is an approach to psychotherapy, self-help and organizational change. Founders Richard Bandler and John Grinder say that NLP is a model of interpersonal communication and a system of alternative therapy which seeks to educate people in self-awareness and effective...

theorems that Playboy removed.
Portions of this work are reprinted (reedited by Wilson with an added explanation of his problem with Playboy) in his 1988 work Coincidance.