How Bridgerton’s real life Lady Whistledown scandalised 18th-century society

The subversive work of Eliza Haywood, the feminist forerunner of the TV show’s gossip columnist, is about to be republished

She is the real-life Lady Whistledown, an eyebrow-raising female writer who penned a salacious anonymous gossip sheet that skewered 18th-century London society.

Like the fictional pamphlet from Netflix hit Bridgerton, which returned for a third series last week, Eliza Haywood’s The Parrot, published in 1746, has a distinctive, mocking voice that punches up and “speaks truth to power”. Now, a new book will republish Haywood’s funny, subversive periodical, which she wrote from the perspective of an angry green parrot, and seek to raise awareness of her groundbreaking work.