Subversive Didacticism in Eliza Haywood's Betsy Thoughtless

Abstract

'The Story of Eliza Haywood, her shift from slyly subversive novels of amorous intrigue to market acceptable novels of female virtue and obedience, clouds most readings of The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless (1751).2 Lady Trusty's patriarchal conductbook advice to Betsy is often read literally as Haywood's new advice for her female audience. However, Haywood's audience consisted of both men and women, and Lady Trusty's bridal admonitions, the most conservative and patriarchal words of advice in the novel, are contradictory and impossible for any woman to execute completely. Few doubt Jane Austen's satiric voice and sarcastic didacticism and all embrace Henry Fielding's, yet 'The Story seems to prevent this type of reading of Haywood. Always a social critic and sometimes a political writer, Haywood seems to have held a contract theory partnership with her readers: she attempts to educate her audience through her novels, not in the didactic sense of the way the world should be, but in the sense of the way the world is. Though Betsy Thoughtless seems a story of a reformed coquette complete with marital advice, Haywood dem-