Elizabeth Boyd

Elizabeth Boyd (c. 1710 – 1745) was an English writer and poet who supported her family by writing novels, poetry, a play, and a periodical. She also wrote under the noms de plume Louisa or Eloisa. Boyd is one of three known members of the Shakespeare Ladies Club.

Life and work

Little is known of her birth or career. From her writings it can be gleaned that she came from a large family who had supported the Stuart cause. Her father enjoyed Stuart favour, her mother is said to have been worn down by the care of many children. It was to support her ailing mother that she took up writing. The subscription lists to her work contain many aristocrats which suggests the family had been well connected but had fallen on hard times.

She first published poetry under the name of Louisa, Variety:A Poem (1727) and Verses on the King's Birthday (1730). It is a masquerade romance in which the lead female characters hide behind masks for most of the story. With money from this she set up a stationers shop in George Court, Princes Street, London, near Leicester Fields Don Sancho takes place in an Oxford College garden and features the ghosts of William Shakespeare and John Dryden.