{"id":28,"date":"2015-05-15T01:11:42","date_gmt":"2015-05-15T01:11:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/josephinetaylor.com\/?page_id=28"},"modified":"2022-05-23T06:05:56","modified_gmt":"2022-05-23T06:05:56","slug":"projects","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/josephinetaylor.com\/?page_id=28","title":{"rendered":"Eye of a Rook"},"content":{"rendered":"

Josephine Taylor’s novel\u00a0Eye of a Rook<\/em>\u00a0was published by Fremantle Press in 2021. Josephine was shortlisted for the 2021 WA Premier’s Book Awards<\/a><\/strong><\/span> in the Emerging Writer Category Prize for this debut novel, a work of literary historical fiction.\u00a0In writing\u00a0Eye of a Rook<\/em>,\u00a0Josephine was mentored by\u00a0Susan Midalia<\/a><\/strong><\/span>. Book cover design is from\u00a0Nada Backovic<\/span><\/strong><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

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An \u2018unflinching representation of women\u2019s bodies, women\u2019s voices, and specifically women\u2019s pain, in a novel that is compelling, well-paced, and engaging from start to finish\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n

DEBRA ADELAIDE, Australian Book Review<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u2018A masterful exploration of the tangled relationship between body and self; bold and intellectually tough, and intensely lyrical.\u2019 <\/span><\/p>\n

LEE KOFMAN<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u2018Eye of a Rook<\/em> is raw and intelligent, a searing depiction of the secret journey of female bodies.\u2019 <\/span><\/p>\n

DONNA MAZZA<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u2018Eye of a Rook<\/em> centres the voices of women in extreme pain in a compelling, intelligent, lyrical and distinctly feminist narrative.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n

RASHIDA MURPHY, Writing WA<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cNow, Mr Rochdale.\u201d The surgeon leans back in his leather chair.\u00a0<\/em>\u201cBefore I give you my diagnosis, I require some facts from you about your wife. Is she restless\u2014perhaps, excitable? Or is she of a melancholic disposition? Even \u2026 shall we say \u2026 withdrawn from you?\u201d<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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In Victorian London, Arthur Rochdale\u2019s wife Emily is struck down by a pain for which she can find no words. In desperation, Arthur seeks the aid of Isaac Baker Brown and contemplates the surgeon\u2019s terrifying treatment for \u2018hysterical\u2019 women at his London Surgical Home.<\/span><\/p>\n

Almost 150 years later, writer and academic Alice Tennant explores the history of hysteria to make sense of her own mystifying and private pain. Although she has direct access to a medical profession that should be able to help her, it seems that little has changed since 1866.<\/span><\/p>\n

Circling ever closer to Arthur and Emily\u2019s story, Alice begins to question her own life and marriage. With understanding comes the discovery of the possibilities of creativity \u2013 and a newfound knowledge of self that will change the course of Alice\u2019s life.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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\u2018It would be a mistake to pigeonhole Eye of a Rook<\/em> as a novel exclusively “about” illness or chronic pain \u2013 it is also deeply interested in themes such as female sexuality, relationships and broader attitudes towards women’s bodies … Taylor has given voice to both her characters and the under-represented community to which they belong with sensitivity, intelligence and insight.\u2019 GEMMA NISBET, The West Australian<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018Courageous and enthralling \u2026 this compassionate, beautifully written book explores important questions about the forces that make us who we are and who we might wish to become.\u2019 SUSAN MIDALIA<\/span><\/p>\n

Eye of a Rook<\/em>\u00a0is available at all booksellers in Australia and New Zealand, or direct from the\u00a0Fremantle Press website<\/a><\/strong><\/span>. It can be\u00a0ordered through bookstores in North America and the United Kingdom and through\u00a0Amazon<\/a><\/strong><\/span>. The eBook version is also readily available.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Two extracts from\u00a0Eye of a Rook<\/em>\u00a0follow.\u00a0<\/span>See the bottom of the page for a listing of the primary texts used in the research and writing of the novel.<\/span><\/p>\n

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London, 1866<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Emily makes herself seemly.<\/span><\/p>\n

Arthur imagines it thus, siting in the adjoining room. But the particularities of her actions are obscure to him. Was his wife made to remove her crinoline for the examination? Her chemise? Is anyone there now to help her robe\u2014to pull the laces of her stays tight, sculpting that biddable waist? He has not been privy to these intimate moments for some time, but still he remembers, and hopes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Arthur pictures Emily. The milky skin where the sun has not touched; the smooth slope of her buttocks, which has been solely his province. He sees the grey-blue of her eyes. Strokes the side of her face, with its sprinkle of light freckles. Scoops up her hair, red-gold and silky in his hands.<\/span><\/p>\n

He wishes he could be with her so she is not left undone, shamed by all she has endured.<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, here he is, listening to the surgeon scratching notes at his stately desk, trying to fool himself that he is in a drawing room\u2014because, look at the ornaments cluttering the mantel; and there, the heavy sofas illuminated in the light sidling past velvet curtains. But the certificates above an elaborately carved cabinet remind him otherwise. Arthur peers through the hazy air. President of the Medical Society of London 1865<\/em>, announces one. Another gilt-edged document proclaims an opening: The London Surgical Home for the Reception of Gentlewomen and Females of Respectability suffering from Curable Surgical Diseases<\/em>. He can just make out the year: 1858. How many gentlewomen have been brought here in the intervening years? Have their husbands or their fathers sat in this same overstuffed chair? Were their thoughts as his: addled with concern and suspicion; terrified of consequences this man might not disclose? Though spare of figure, Mr Isaac Baker Brown has the look of a large horse harnessed to a plough. Is he as solid and unstoppable?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNow, Mr Rochdale.\u201d The surgeon leans back in his leather chair. \u201cBefore I give you my diagnosis, I require some facts from you about your wife. Is she restless\u2014perhaps, excitable? Or is she of a melancholic disposition? Even \u2026 shall we say \u2026 withdrawn from you?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

What can he say, when the questions are so weighted with authority?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cShe manifests these qualities in turn.\u201d It seems disloyal to talk about Emily in this way to a stranger, but even as he speaks, Arthur feels the burden of his wife\u2019s peculiar malady shifting. \u201cSometimes she has such nervous excitability she is unable to sleep and paces restlessly by day. But then she is prostrated by nervous exhaustion and weeps and sighs ceaselessly.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The steel nib of Baker Brown\u2019s pen scrapes at paper. Arthur imagines other instruments this hand must hold: a caustic compound, surgical scissors\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

His mind shies away.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Perth, 2008<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Alice\u00a0pulled the curtain across, took off her skirt and undies and climbed onto the bench, pulling the crisp sheet over her torso. Let her knees relax outwards and tried to forget the other people with whom she\u2019d opened herself this way \u2013 the cold metal implements and even colder fingertips. She breathed deeply into her abdomen, into her pelvis, trying to send kind thoughts there, but her mind skittered and her heart still drummed its warning.
\nShe heard the snick of the door as Sasha returned, the whoosh of the billowing curtain.
\n\u2018Okay, so I\u2019m going to begin with seeing how the vestibule is doing.\u2019
\nAlice put her head back on the pillow, closed her eyes and waited for the first sensation: the cotton bud like a pin.
\n\u2018How\u2019s that?\u2019
\n\u2018A three.\u2019 Not too bad. \u2018Five \u2026 Four \u2026 Five \u2026\u2019 Alice tried to place each discrete sensation on the map in her mind. \u2018Seven \u2013 is that nearer the urethra?\u2019
\n\u2018Yes, one of the glands close to the urethral opening. What about this?\u2019
\n\u2018Seven again, I think.\u2019
\nThe needling slipped down the pain scale again.
\n\u2018So, a little better overall,\u2019 Sasha commented.
\n\u2018Still worse at the front than the back.\u2019
\n\u2018Yes, the pain\u2019s always been more focused there for you, hasn\u2019t it?\u2019 Alice heard the sound of the bin closing, and water running down the drain. \u2018Non-latex gloves, Alice. And warm water to help.\u2019 Sasha always remembered this too: how reactive her skin had proven, even though it was just latex, just gel. With a stab of grief, she recalled sex with Duncan in the early days: ribbed condoms \u2013 for her pleasure, announced the box \u2013 and raiding the fridge, foods outside and in. The laughing, sweaty joy. The utter abandonment to pleasure. Sasha\u2019s hand brought her back, lodging her in her body with stretching and pulling, then pressure.
\n\u2018Okay, so I\u2019m inside the vagina now and I\u2019m palpating the muscles around the vaginal wall. Can you feel that?\u2019
\n\u2018It\u2019s sore, but it feels okay. It\u2019s like it needs to be stretched.\u2019
\n\u2018Good. Yes, there\u2019s some tightness, but not as much as you had, perhaps.\u2019
\nThe pressure was reaching into her body now, and swivelling.
\n\u2018Is that the obturator internus?\u2019
\n\u2018Yes, that\u2019s right,\u2019 said Sasha.
\nIn her mind\u2019s eye, Alice recreated the tracings she\u2019d made from the anatomy atlas. Muscles and ligaments and tendons; busily interweaving nerves; and blood vessels, blues and reds tidy and contained. The journeys taken by all these unfathomable structures around and between jutting bones, this intricate web that somehow held the pelvis together in a beauty of form and function. And the rhythm of the words she\u2019d copied from the atlas, whispering them to herself like poetry: ischiococcygeus<\/em>, puborectalis<\/em>, ischial tuberosity<\/em> \u2026
\nWas Sasha visualising all this as she pressed and massaged? Making sense of threads, knots and bumps by placing them in the anatomical bowl she carried in her mind? Alice tried to hold it, too, that picture of her pelvis, rotate it into depth and life; strained to marry what she could now feel with what she\u2019d seen: neat, discrete anatomical parts. But it was as if the two things were entirely different. Completely unconnected. Two bodies, she reminded herself. And two senses: sight and an unfamiliar kind of \u2026 It was hard to know what to call the other. Inner sensation? Kinaesthesia? In any case, less precise than the kind of touch she was used to and almost as if she were underwater, or immersed in some kind of viscous flux where she was the feeler and the felt, the prober and the probed, and inside, the spongy muscular warm wet around her \u2013 gooey, mucousy, ropey, gluggy and straining aching needling and everything muddled and messy in a passageway, a cone, a cylinder, a vortex \u2026 nerves wetly sparking abody a mind a brain? Something is wrong, and swimming through it, the wrongness, dissolving in it or dissolved by it, boundaries gone and just the feeling there. Right there.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Many texts were used in\u00a0researching and writing\u00a0Eye of a Rook<\/em>. Those most relied upon are listed here.<\/span><\/p>\n

Historical<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n