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While it is difficult to take the Phallic School of Architecture with any sense of sobriety, it’s equally difficult to deny the suggestiveness of many of its exemplars. Indeed, the skyscraper—while it redefined the limits of urban real estate by economizing more vertical space than horizontal—can also be said to symbolize man’s eagerness to thrust himself toward the sky with no holds barred.

Here are ten prime examples of such phallic architecture.

Perennially recognized for its brilliant coasts, crazy football fans, and bikini-clad bods, Brazil is just one of those places you have to see before you die. Here’s a quick rundown of what to look forward to when in this bonito beach-land—plus the Havaianas contest that might get you there sooner than you think!

Christ the Redeemer, or O Cristo Redentor, as it’s called in Portuguese, is a 130-foot statue at the peak of the Corcovado Mountain in Rio de Janeiro depicting a standing Jesus Christ with his arms flung open over the city below. Considered the largest art deco statue on the planet, this towering sculpture was named one of the Seven New Wonders of the World just a little over two years ago.

She first wrote under the pseudonym “A Lady” to protect her gentry family from the scandal of a working daughter—but now, the name Jane Austen is known throughout the world as belonging to the author of six of the greatest novels in the English language. With her biting social commentary on Georgian-era customs and her penchant for nobly-phrased but thinly-veiled irony, Austen was a woman—and a writer—ahead of her time. But aside from the whip marks left by her wit and the standards she set for intelligently-written comedy, this famously reclusive novelist from jolly old England left the most lasting impression with her page-turning, heart-stirring stories of love.

Any Austen plotline is the epitome of romance: an attachment develops between two people, but circumstances created by society (or sometimes by the couple themselves) occur so that they cannot be together—yet. Although she herself never married, Austen’s heroines ultimately meet their match—after a series of foibles have come between them, of course. The romantic formulas so overused in modern-day media are nothing to the novels of Austen; hers are the originals from which clichés draw power. And it seems that people just can’t get enough! In the ‘90s, following the release of BBC miniseries Pride and Prejudice and Ang Lee’s feature film Sense and Sensibility, a “Janeite” fan culture devoted to the writer, her works, and their subsequent adaptations emerged, and has thrived ever since.

Curious about the Austen craze? Read on for a crash course in Miss Jane’s amorous oeuvre.

Sense and Sensibility (1811)

When a certain Mr. Dashwood dies, his estate must pass to his son John—leaving his second wife and their three daughters with no property and virtually no money.  John’s greedy wife Fanny wishes to be sole mistress of the estate, so the Dashwood women are forced to move into a small country cottage far away. The two eldest daughters, on whom the story centers, experience romance and heartache in their makeshift home. Sensible Elinor is stirred by the attentions of Edward Ferrars, Fanny’s gentle younger brother, but is disappointed when he doesn’t come to visit their new quarters; ever reserved, however, she reveals her feelings to no one. Romantic Marianne, on the other hand, is courted by two men at once: the gentlemanly Colonel Brandon, whom she deems too old, and the dashing John Willoughby, whom she favors (quite vocally). Will the Dashwood sisters end up with the men of their dreams, or will an excess of passion—or propriety—get the better of them?

Popular adaptations: Two BBC TV serials, in 1981 and in 2008; a 1995 British film starring Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet; Kandukondain Kandukondain, a 2000 film in the Tamil dialect of India; Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, a 2009 parody novel by Ben H. Winters

Trivia: When publisher Thomas Egerton agreed to print Sense and Sensibility in 1811, Austen actually paid for the publishing costs and even awarded Egerton with a commission on sale—quite the opposite practice from modern publication.

(Photo c/o Columbia Pictures)