Christopher Smart is one of my favourite 18th Century writers.
His poems Jubilate Agno and Song of David are sublime, a lot of his earlier jokey stuff is actually funny and his later poems are often very moving. (Such as 'On a Bed of Guernsey Lillies', which talks about how those plants flowering in Autumn are like visiting 'strangers on a rainy day' and serve to remind us that 'we never are deserted, quite' - and this written 8 years locked in a madhouse, possibly unjustly).
He also has some interest to trans-types as he used to run a magazine under the female pseudonym of Mary Midnight, an old midwife and later on used to put on drag variety/burlesque shows under this name.
One of the articles in that magazine 'The Midwife' talks about a character called Jemmy Gymp who is being recommended as a subeditor for the magazine because of his interestingly liminal position between male and female.
The sexes in him are so united, you won't know what to call him; for as a certain Nobleman expresses it. 'Nature whilst Jemmy's Clay was blending, Uncertain what the Thing would end in, Whether a Female, or a Male, a Pin drop'd in, and turn'd the Scale.' He is a Creature of vast Imagination and nice Conceit.'
It then goes to talk about Jemmy's various inventions and builds him up as a positive Da Vinci. This is mainly so Mary Midnight can dismiss him as a 'fribble'.
Of cours Jemmy never existed, nor the nobleman, nor Mary Midnight - the whole magazine is just Kit Smart talking to himself but I think it's an interesting piece nonetheless.
