The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless (The ^AWorld's Classics) - Softcover

Haywood, Eliza

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0192824902 ISBN 13: 9780192824905

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1997

Synopsis

A lively, pretty young orphan with a large fortune, Miss Betsy Thoughtless is courted by several eligible suitors. Enjoying their adoration, she dallies with their affections and postpones marriage. Her flirtatiousness, however, alienates the right man, and scares her guardian into marrying her off to a brutish husband. This is one of the first novels (1751) to depict a heroine questioning the sexual double standard and institution of marriage. This is the only edition in print of this provocative story of sexual politics.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

Prolific even by eighteenth-century standards, Eliza Haywood was the author of more than eighty titles, including short fiction, novels, periodicals, plays, poetry, and a political pamphlet for which she was briefly jailed. From her early successes (most notably Love in Excess) to later novels such as Betsy Thoughtless (her best known work) she remained widely read, yet sneered at as a ‘stupid, infamous, scribbling woman’ by the likes of Swift and Pope.

Betsy Thoughtless is the story of the slow metamorphosis of the heroine from thoughtless coquette to thoughtful wife. Ironically, the most decisive moment in this development may be when Betsy decides to leave her emotionally abusive and financially punishing husband; it is only after experiencing independence that she returns to her marriage and to what becomes her husbands deathbed. Betsy Thoughtless may be the first real novel of female development in English. In this edition the text is accompanied by appendices, including writings from the period that shed light on Haywood’s life and work, and on her relationship with contemporaries such as Henry Fielding.

About the Author:

Christine Blouch, a professor in the Department of English at Bradley University, Illinois, has written widely on Haywood’s life and works.

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0192824902
• ISBN 13: 9780192824905
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 624
• Editor: Tobin Beth Fowkes