The Anti-Pamela: Or, Feign’d Innocence Detected (1741) is a novel by Eliza Haywood. Blending tragedy and comedy, Haywood explores the intersection of gender and class to reveal how women perform and experience desire. Written in response to Samuel Richardson’s Pamela; Or, Virtue Rewarded, a novel in which a young girl resists the advances of her wealthy employer and eventually marries him honorably, Haywood’s novel flips the portrayal of static feminine desire on its head. Unlike Pamela, her protagonist is an anti-heroine who wields her sexuality for the purpose of social mobility, showing resilience and determination despite her repeated failures. Syrena Tricksy knows what she wants from men. To get it, she disguises herself as an unmarried aristocrat, a mistress, a widow, and a libertine, each time in pursuit of a wealthy nobleman to marry. Playing these parts with ease, she frequently gets in her own way, failing at the last moment through carelessness and greed. Resourceful and independent, Syrena is a character at odds with the stereotypical portrayal of feminine sexuality. She may not be perfect, but she is never passive. As a parody of Samuel Richardson’s popular novel of morality, The Anti-Pamela: Or, Feign’d Innocence Detected lampoons the unrealistic character at the heart of Pamela, a woman who gets what she wants through virtue alone. This edition of Eliza Haywood’s The Anti-Pamela: Or, Feign’d Innocence Detected is a classic of English literature reimagined for modern readers.
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Über den Autor
Eliza Haywood (1693-1756) was an English novelist, poet, playwright, actress, and publisher. Notoriously private, Haywood is a major figure in English literature about whom little is known for certain. Scholars believe she was born Eliza Fowler in Shropshire or London, but are unclear on the socioeconomic status of her family. She first appears in the public record in 1715, when she performed in an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens in Dublin. Famously portrayed as a woman of ill-repute in Alexander Pope’s Dunciad (1743), it is believed that Haywood had been deserted by her husband to raise their children alone. Pope’s account is likely to have come from poet Richard Savage, with whom Haywood was friends for several years beginning in 1719 before their falling out. This period coincided with the publication of Love in Excess (1719-1720), Haywood’s first and best-known novel. Alongside Delarivier Manley and Aphra Behn, Haywood was considered one of the leading romance writers of her time. Haywood’s novels, such as Idalia; or The Unfortunate Mistress (1723) and The Distress’d Orphan; or Love in a Madhouse (1726), often explore the domination and oppression of women by men. The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless (1751), one of Haywood’s final novels, is a powerful story of a woman who leaves her abusive husband, experiences independence, and is pressured to marry once more. Highly regarded by feminist scholars today, Haywood was a prolific writer who revolutionized the English novel while raising a family, running a pamphlet shop in Covent Gardens, and pursuing a career as an actress and writer for some of London’s most prominent theaters.
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