Anorexic: Poet & Context

Context

“Anorexic” is a poem by Eavan Boland, one of the best-known female voices in contemporary Irish literature. Boland is particularly noted for exploring themes of identity, history, and the role of women within both.
Written in the late 20th century, the poem explores the personal and societal pressures that contribute to the development of anorexia, using this as a metaphor for larger issues.
Boland often uses personal and domestic themes to illuminate larger issues, such as politics, gender inequality and national identity.

Boland uses religious language and literary allusions, notably to Christian sacraments and rituals. This heightens the seriousness and destructiveness of the illness, framing it as a kind of twisted devotion or misplaced spiritual practice.
Powerful imagery is used to present the speaker’s body wasting away. Phrases such as ‘her skeleton’s thinness’ and ‘shrinking like a node’ serve to depict the grim physical reality of anorexia.
Boland’s use of the first-person voice gives a deeply personal perspective on anorexia, creating empathy and understanding in the reader.
The juxtaposition of beautiful, ethereal descriptions with harsh, brutal realities throughout the poem creates a stark and powerful contrast, mirroring the conflict between societal beauty standards and the devastating impact of trying to achieve them.

The body is a key symbol in the poem, it becomes both the battleground and the site of struggle, representing the fight against societal norms of beauty.
The flesh in the poem acts as a metaphor for both physical and psychological suffering of the speaker, and it is seen as something to be overcome or erased in the pursuit of thinness.
The wedding dress in the poem acts as a symbol of societal expectations of women - not only to marry, but to conform to certain beauty standards.
Themes in the poem include identity, body image and societal pressure, with Boland using the personal experience of anorexia as a lens to explore wider societal issues.