“Are You Here?”: Medical Education and Poetry in Jane Barker’s Galesia Trilogy

Jane Barker’s Galesia Trilogy tells the story of Galesia, a young woman who had not only studied simples and botany with her brother but also the anatomy scholarship of Thomas Willis and William Harvey and others. While Galesia goes on to establish a burgeoning medical practice in London, both her medical reading and practice have to be abandoned due to social constraints. Into this narrative of frustration and exclusion, Barker inserts “Anatomy”, a poem ostensibly written by Galesia after reading her now-deceased brother’s books. This essay argues Barker’s poem uses common placing within a narrative of medical education to create an anatomy lecture for Galesia, one where she is explicitly made welcome in a scene of learning. Through collecting passages, Barker deploys in verse the metaphors, technical language, and Latin of anatomy texts, while also condensing and re-figuring their descriptions of processes. “Anatomy”, then, demonstrates a professional competence not permitted in fiction rooted in the real world, one that is not ended by a mother’s concern for chastity.