Beautiful Flesh: A Body of Essays

by Stephanie G'Schwind (Editor)

Selected from the country’s leading literary journals and publications— Colorado Review ,  Creative Nonfiction ,  Georgia Review ,  Prairie Schooner ,  Crazyhorse ,  The Normal School , and others— Beautiful Flesh  gathers eighteen essays on the body, essentially building a multi-gender, multi-ethnic body out of essays, each concerning a different part of the belly, brain, bones, blood, ears, eyes, hair, hands, heart, lungs, nose, ovaries, pancreas, sinuses, skin, spine, teeth, and vas deferens. The title is drawn from Wendy Call’s essay “Beautiful Flesh,” a meditation on the “gorgeously ugly, hideously crimson globes embedded in a pinkish-tan oval, all nestled on a bed of cabbage-olive green, spun through with gossamer gold.” Other essays include Dinty W. Moore’s “The Aquatic Ape,” in which the author explores the curious design and necessity of sinuses; Katherine E. Standefer’s “Shock to the Heart, A Primer on the Practical Applications of Electricity,” a modular essay about the author’s internal cardiac defibrillator and the nature of electricity; Matt Roberts’s “Vasectomy Instruction 7,” in which the author considers the various reasons for and implications of surgically severing and sealing the vas deferens; and Peggy Shinner’s “Elective,” which examines the author’s own experience with rhinoplasty and cultural considerations of the “Jewish nose.” Echoing the myriad shapes, sizes, abilities, and types of the human body, these essays showcase the many forms of the personal, memoir, lyric, braided, and so on. Contributors : Amy Butcher, Wendy Call, Steven Church, Sarah Rose Etter, Matthew Ferrence, Hester Kaplan, Sarah K. Lenz, Lupe Linares, Jody Mace, Dinty W. Moore, Angela Pelster, Matt Roberts, Peggy Shinner, Samantha Simpson, Floyd Skloot, Danielle R. Spencer, Katherine E. Standefer, Kaitlyn Teer, Sarah Viren, Vicki Weiqi Yang

Genres: Nonfiction, Disability, Essays, Anthologies

256 pages, Paperback

First published May 15, 2017

Reviews

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

What does it mean to have a body? How do our bodies work, and how do they fail? To ponder further, reference librarian Katrin Abel recommends that you check out the essay collection Beautiful Flesh, edited by Stephanie G'Schwind. Embark on a literary inspection of the human body from head to toe, revisit birth, childhood and high school—which “remains forever the place where flesh is tattered”—and reflect upon Mike Tyson’s assertion that “everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”

[Viv · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rich and well-chosen collection. Distinct voices, but converges greatly in a thematic (and, often, stylistic) chorus. Some essays are exquisite, some border on the saccharine and contrived. All very personal. To invite another to view one's body is to inherently be vulnerable.

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fully worth ordering it from a niche book shop that only employs grown men with ponytails. #humblebrag

[Crystal · Rating 5 out of 5]

So, I read this because a friend's essay was selected. This selectiin of essays is amazing. I'm so, so glad I read them and that I read them slowly enough to savor them.