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Eliza Haywood - born as Elizabeth Fowler, was an English writer, actress and publisher. It is difficult to track her exact biography because she gave very conflicting accounts of her life, resulting in the only thing scholars being able to agree upon is the date of her death.
Haywood’s early life remains very mysterious; scholars do not know when she was exactly born, or precisely where. Similarly, we do not know exactly what her social status or education was either. The first record we have of her entering the public eye is when she was listed as “Mrs. Haywood” while performing in an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens.
She supported her living through writing, acting and adapting literature for the theatre. She was criticized for her writing; Alexander Pope attacked her with a poem he wrote, and Jonathan Swift called her a “stupid infamous woman”. She published a great deal of her work; poetry collections, novels, political essays and adaptations of plays, but in addition to her own writing, Eliza Haywood worked as a publisher. She published and collaborated with William Hatchett on at least nine works, and they were sold at The Sign of Frame, a pamphlet shop in Covent Garden.
Given Haywood’s mysterious and controversial life, including her poetry and writing into the canon would add color and excitement. Her work is both unique and interdisciplinary; crossing genres and styles. Seeing a woman writer from the time unapologetically write such diverse and decisive writing is exciting and worth exploring.
Poems on Several Occasions by Eliza Haywood
A page from her writing can be found here
Haywood, Eliza Fowler. The British recluse: or, the secret history of Cleomira, suppos'd dead. A novel. By Mrs. Eliza Haywood, Author of Love in Excess; or, the Fatal Enquiry. Printed for D. Brown, Jun. at the Black-Swan, without Temple-Bar ; W. Chetwood , and J. Woodman , in Russel-Street Covent-Garden ; and S. Chapman, in Palmall, MDCCXXII. [1722]. Eighteenth Century Collections Online, http://find.gale.com/ecco/infomark.do?&source=gale&docLevel=FASCIMILE&prodId=ECCO&userGroupName=umd_um&tabID=T001&docId=CW3311947035&type=multipage&contentSet=ECCOArticles&version=1.0. Accessed 12 Mar. 2020.
Works Cited
“Eliza Haywood.” The Open Anthology of Literature in English, virginia-anthology.org/eliza-haywood/.
“Eliza Haywood.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 13 Jan. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliza_Haywood#Biography.
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