Anne Billington
Fish Woman
The woman turns herself into a fish is a poem about sexlessness and women’s
rights in “The Woman Turns Herself Into a Fish” by Eavan Boland. This poem explores
women’s rights through an interesting lens of sex organs and sea creatures. What if we
were all created equal? It is an impossible dream that raises many questions about how
men and women treat each other now and what is and isn’t right. This poem asks what
should a woman want to be, what is a woman to society and what is a woman to herself?
The poem begins with the lines “Unpod/the bag/the seed.” Discussing how the
author wants to transform from human to fish, to change from something sexual with
“seeds” to something indiscriminate. The author then goes on to discuss the flattening of
her “rump” or her butt and turning her mouth and eyes into that of a fish. These are
important features because they are the features that men often look to when they think of
sex, the eyes, the mouth, and the butt. Here the author wants to eliminate any trace of her
sexual prowess or her status as a woman.
Next the author seeks to rid herself of her womanhood by saying, “eclipse in these
hips, these loins/the moon, the blood flux. It’s done.” Let’s look at the author’s use of the
word “eclipse” here, it is the last phase of the moon blocking out the sun and it blocks it
out entirely in this phase. This is important when considering her use of the term “eclipse
in these hips” she wants her hips blocked out entirely. She then references her loins and
the moon and but in an eclipse the moon and the sun are equally as dark so she wants to
cover her loins as well. The “blood flux” or blood flowing out is done, which is her goal,
to no longer be a woman and no longer be concerned with bleeding, loins and hips.
The author is now a fish, she says, “I turn, /I flab upward/blub-lipped, /hipless/and
I am/sexless,/ shed/ of ecstasy” her goal of shedding her womanhood has been reached
and she has turned from her female nature to the nature of a fish. We know that the
author wants to be a fish because of the title of the poem and because of her use of words
like “flab” and “blub-lipped.” It is here that the author explains why she wants to be a
fish. The word “hipless” comes with contentions? like youth and not being a woman yet.
This is clearly her goal as she moves onto saying “sexless” and “shed of ecstasy”
demonstrating that she no longer wants to be a sex symbol or absorbed in sex. A fish is
not a non-sexual creature but an animal that looks the same whether male or female and
so it’s hips, breasts, and butt make no difference in the sexual process.
However, though the author doesn’t want to have all the trappings of being female
she does want to be beautiful, “a pale
swimmer,
sequin-skinned, pearling
eggs/screamlessly
in seaweed. It's what
I set my heart on.” Perhaps it is that the author
doesn’t want to be society’s version of a beautiful female but wants to be her own version
of a sexy and enticing woman. This is why she has picked the image of the fish, because
it is unusual and this is why she says things like “pearling eggs.” She is not completely
against being female as she had earlier expressed but she wishes to be reborn into a new
version of female, one that has power over her own femininity and her own sex. She
wants to be a fish, the same as a man, but as beautiful and fertile as a woman.
Now that the author has established her new version of womanhood she finds that
she is still not happy, “Yet/ruddering
and muscling
in the sunless tons/of new
freedoms,
still
I feel/a chill pull” we know she is not happy because she uses words
like “sunless”, “Yet” and “still” along with the term “chill.” The reader also knows that
the author is disappointed because when she speaks of her ‘new freedoms’ she says that
they are ‘sunless’ so though there are ‘tons’ of them, nobody sees them and she sees
nobody. As a social activist what is the point in activating change if it will remain hidden
and only change the author? Her transformation into a fish might be the best thing that
has ever happened to a woman but if she is the only woman-fish that it is pointless.
Boland finishes the poem the truth of how no person can completely go against
nature, “a brightening,
a light, a light,/and how in my loomy cold,
my greens,/still
she
moons
in me.” Here the author is saying that she is in a “loomy cold” and that inside her
there is a “light” that is the eclipse from earlier. All the societal female parts of her that
she blocked out are still inside of her and like an eclipse the sun will show again when the
moon moves on. She will become “female” again but according to the last line the
“moons” still inside of her and she is still capable of changing into a fish.
The author’s ultimate point is against the role that females have been cast in
society. Not their household role, or the idea of marriage but the reproductive idea of
motherhood and the male views on sex and objectivity. The way this poem presents the
parts of women as things to be deflated or “flattened” expresses the male view of women
as ass, tits and legs. This poem seeks to display the fact that women are often viewed as
the sum of their bodies while also showing that they are more than the best body part they
possess. If women and men all looked the same and sex was about reproduction not looks
then the intelligence and other features of the species would be valued.
However, as the author points out, it is impossible in our current state to ever
completely move beyond the physical form. Even as a fish she was after the shimmering
scales and beauty so she was incapable of wanting pure sexlessness. The poem implies
with the ending that there is no pure sexless state because when she was in the cold
waters, viewed only for her intelligence, she still felt the sun coming out and when the
sun came back out she felt the moon hidden inside her. So to be female is to be torn
between the sexual prowess of your body and the mental capacity of your intelligence.
Though she implies that this choice is one that the female has the freedom to make, the
power to control.
It is in the hands of the woman how she wants to be seen and what part of her she
wants to “use.” Is she the woman or the fish? It is her transformation from woman to fish
as she moves through life that gives women power where men can only see what is
presented to them; the fish or the woman. Like the metaphor of the eclipse there is either
a sun, a moon, or neither for men, while all three exists simultaneously inside of every
woman. She is constantly changing, but also changing back because, as the author points
out it is lonely to be a fish.
Even though every woman can become a fish it is lonely to be one because if
becoming a fish is like an eclipse than the reader is to assume that is it rare. This means
that women very seldom choose their intelligence over their sex. This could be another
one of the author’s comments on society this time directed at the females in society and
how they prolong the stereotype of a patriarchal society. This stereotype allows for
women to get paid less in the workplace for doing the same amount of work.
The author of this poem is Irish and Irish women’s rights are different than
American or British women’s rights. Ireland has always been connected with the Catholic
Church and has been considered the most repressive country in Europe when it comes to
women. The Catholic rule leaves little freedom for the female sex and gives most of the
leeway to the men. The church provided an ideological basis for sexual repression with
the idea of no sex before marriage and late marriages. Saying that sex outside of marriage
was evil and holding women more accountable than men. It also failed to provide an
economic role for women leaving them as mothers and wives for centuries.
In the atmosphere of religious repression it would be very hard for a woman to
break out of her shell and consider becoming a ‘fish’ for very long. The entire society is
ruled by one religion and the women of Ireland also buy into the repression of that
religion. It is the ideas of having all three stages of the eclipse inside themselves that
stands out here. They buy into the religion but they are also aware of what they are
capable of that the Church doesn’t support. Being a moon and a sun at once because they
believe in society, sex, and intelligence. The fact that this poet expresses that all Irish
women are secretly unhappy with the role the Church has given them is a very big
statement to be making in the times.
Also the amount of anti-sexual content in this poem is very interesting
considering that it is a Irish poem and written just as the Catholic church was losing
power and women were exploring there sexual power. This poem is primarily about not
wanting to be seen as a sexual object however in a society where women had been
prevented from expressing their sexual freedom for so long it seems out of place. To say
that one wants ones sexual organs to disappear and to flatten is strange when they now
have the ability to sleep with men before marriage. Perhaps the author is seeing the
negative side of sleeping around with men and how it can degrade women or perhaps she
simply believes that it is not enough freedom. Yes women should be allowed to sleep
with whom they chose, and have sex before marriage but shouldn’t their partners also see
them as more than a body or sexual object?
Interestingly isn’t her protest the same as the Church’s? The Church believes that
men and women should only have sex when they are married and not sleep around
outside of marriage because marriage is when you are in love and promised to God.
Similarly the author wishes that men and women could see each other as fish because
they would only see each other’s true traits not their sexual ones and thus promise a real
love. Though they seem at odds because the Church held women back in Irish society the
Author seems to not agree with the movement of sexual freedom or at least the free use
of female bodies that comes with it.
Another interesting view on this poem that is specific to Ireland is the difference
in the term fish. Is fish simply a sexless object in Irish culture? No. Fish are a life source
that have supported many generations of Irish people. They are also connected with Irish
fishing men not women, however the mermaids, or fish themselves are considered
women-like all inanimate objects they are referred to as ‘she’. Thinking of fish as the
female life source of Ireland puts an entirely different spin on this poem. Rather than
thinking about the fish as her sexless state of intelligence she is simply in a state of
ultimate reproductive and sexual heights. As a fish she is the bringer of life in a way that
is not about her body parts or sex with men.
In Conclusion, this poem and it’s metaphors display a time of change in Ireland
and a great deal of discussion over what it is to be a woman. The author is struggling to
be equal with men, society’s view of herself and what she knows herself to be. This poem
is about transformation and change and how it never really works out. People can’t
change into fish not because they don’t want to but because society won’t let them. The
woman in ultimately everything that a woman should be, though she hates those parts of
her self for being recognized, and more than women are allowed to be, though it is rarely
seen.