By Maggie Nelson, from The Argonauts, out next month from Graywolf. Nelson is the author of several books, including Bluets, The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning, and Jane: A Murder.
From Observations in Midwifery, by the English physician Percival Willughby, written around 1670 and published in 1863. One of two known copies of the book, which Willughby wrote “to inform…