from CHAPTER 1: THEATRUM ANATOMICUM

‘And now, which do you want to see, the Theatre of Anatomy or the Theatre of Semantic Poetry? ‘said he.

‘Both,’ said I.

‘Well,’ said he, ‘the Theatre of Anatomy is in 1815.’ ‘I don’t mind,’ said I.

‘That’s O.K. then,’ said he,’ let’s go.’

And we went to the Theatre of Anatomy.

The Theatre of Anatomy was a separate apartment divided off from all other apartments and passages by a single wall of nearly circular outline reaching from floor to ceiling; the ceiling had the shape of a hemisphere, and the floor consisted of a circular space (in the centre) surrounded by four circular platforms rising tier upon tier. Each platform was protected by a handrail supported by bars painted black and white. On the upper platform there was a young man who had his body and limbs placed in such a position that the weight of the body rested, and was balanced, upon the feet, the legs being straightened. His back was a little out of the vertical and his head erect. Both his hands rested on the handrail, but in the right one he held his black top-hat, the inner surface of which was covered with yellow lustrous fabric that had been woven from the fibrous thread spun from the fine strong filament produced by the caterpillars of the moth Bombyx mori, to form their cocoons.

On the circular space in the centre of the floor there was a table. On it stood two large transparent vessels. The first contained a pair of infant human beings joined together by a fleshy ligature; the second — just a normal female foetus in the womb, in an advanced stage of development. The part of the ceiling directly above the table consisted of a hundred and twenty translucent sheets of a hard and brittle substance made by fusing silicate with some other materials, put together in suitable order and position. Midway between the hemisphere and the table the bony framework of a human body from which all the soft tissues had decayed or had been removed, hung on a thick strong cord of intertwined fibres of Sax. This cord passed over a small grooved wheel contained in a block fixed in the centre of the translucent hemisphere. The other end wound round a small wooden cylinder with a short handle, fastened to the pilaster near the door. A man in white trousers and a blue jacket, with a yellow cravat at his neck, appeared at the doorway. He seized the short handle and turned it. The cylinder paid out the thick strong cord which passed over the small grooved wheel, and the bony framework of a human body from which all the soft tissues had decayed or had been removed passed silently through space, down to the level of the table.

‘Are you satisfied?’ asked Bayamus.

I looked at the skeleton. It was beautifully made.

‘Yes,’ I said, ‘certainly I am.’

‘Well,’ he said, ‘I am very glad to hear it,’ he said. ‘And now let’s go to the Theatre of Semantic Poetry.’