There is a double layer of fantasy in Gillian Anderson’s anthology, Want. Anderson is not a sex therapist, but she plays one on TV; it was her role as Jean Milburn on the Netflix series Sex Education that spurred the creation of this collection and — perhaps — encouraged the women who sent in their fantasies to confide in her. At that point the project was called “Dear Gillian”, these visions addressed to a specific reader/listener, “Gillian” herself a fantasy in each writer’s imagination.
The book began when Anderson read Nancy Friday’s My Secret Garden — for the first time — to prepare for the job. That groundbreaking collection of women’s fantasies, first published in 1973, remains a key text in second-wave feminism. Moved and inspired by that example, Anderson put out a call for 21st century women from around the world to send in their sexual desires and dreams and they responded in their hundreds: Want is the result. “Let’s create an era-defining text that cuts right to the heart of what it is to be a woman today,” Anderson wrote when she issued her invitation last year.