An Anatomical Venus - which gives this book its title - was an eighteenth-century anatomical wax sculpture of an idealised woman, a heady mix of eroticism, death and biological verisimilitude. Venus could be opened up and pulled apart by all the men who studied her. She would give up her secrets the first time of asking.
Helen Ivory's new collection The Anatomical Venus examines how women have been portrayed as 'other'; as witches; as hysterics with wandering wombs and as beautiful corpses cast in wax, or on mortuary slabs in TV box sets. A hanged woman addresses the author of the Malleus Maleficarum, a woman diagnosed with 'Housewife Psychosis' recounts her dreams to Freud, and a sex robot has the ear of her keeper. The Anatomical Venus imagines the lives of women sketched in asylum notes and pictures others shut inside cabinets of curiosity.
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[For her neighbour's sickness / was more than merely unnatural / for he sang perfectly without moving his lips - THOU SHALT NOT SUFFER A SORCERESS TO LIVE]***
[Bloodaxe Books, 23 May 2019, 72 pages, ebook, borrowed from @natpoetrylib via @OverDriveLibs]
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This was a treat to read. I enjoyed every poem in this collection. I can't fault a single one. The poems combine realism and fantasy / magical realism which work really well and made this collection a little different than others I've read. The poems explore historical representations and modern representations of women. The poems are all beautifully written and a pleasure to read.