by Paula Byrne
The manuscript provides proof that Mary did not deliberately lie about her age. So we probably should after all accept her statement later in the Memoirs that she was 15 when she married Thomas Robinson. Their wedding took place on 12 April 1773. By this account, she would have been born on 27 November 1757.
When Mary was at the height of her fame, a letter appeared in the Morning Herald newspaper over the signature ‘An invisible SPY’. ‘Mr Editor,’ it began, ‘Many disputes having arisen, respecting the ages of our celebrated Mistresses, I have taken considerable pains to discover their real pretensions to youth, and leave you to judge by the following tabble [sic].’ There followed a list of eight notorious women, among them, ‘Mrs R-b-s-on. Born at Bristol 1757.’ ‘NB,’ added the invisible spy, ‘The above table may be depended on as authentic.’4
A further complication in the jigsaw puzzle of contradictory evidence suggests that she may actually have been born two years earlier than the date given on the gravestone: a scribbled note in the margin of the baptismal register of St Augustine the Less asserts that she was born on 27 November 1756. This, however, was not part of the official record (it was not copied into the Bishop’s Transcript of the register), so it is not decisive evidence in itself. Error or confusion on the part of the parish clerk, or indeed Mary’s parents, is a plausible explanation. The balance of the evidence favours the following year. In order to avoid constant reiteration of such phrases as ‘when she was 15 or 16’, I have assumed a birth date of 27 November 1757. Scrupulous readers may make a mental note of the possibility that one year should always be added! What can be said – on the basis of the baptismal record, the newspaper report and the original manuscript of the Memoirs – is that the 1758 birth date assumed by posterity is certainly wrong and that both Mrs Robinson herself and some of her public believed that she was born in 1757.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
THE WORKS OF MARY ROBINSON
Poems by Mrs Robinson (London: C. Parker, 1775).
Captivity, a Poem; And Celadon and Lydia, a Tale (London: T. Becket, 1777).
The Songs, Chorusses, etc. in The Lucky Escape, a Comic Opera (London: printed for the Author, 1778), staged at Drury Lane, full text unpublished.
Ainsi va le Monde, a poem inscribed to Robert Merry, as Laura Maria (London: John Bell, 1790), 2nd edn, 1791.
Poems by Mrs Robinson, vol. i (London: J. Bell, 1791), vol. ii (London: printed by T. Spilsbury and sold by J. Evans, 1793; repr. as Poems: A New Edition, c. 1795).
The Beauties of Mrs Robinson. Selected and Arranged from her Poetical Works (London: H. D. Symonds, 1791).
Impartial Reflections on the Present Situation of the Queen of France by a Friend to Humanity (London: John Bell, 1791).
Vancenza; or, the Dangers of Credulity, 2 vols (London: printed for the Authoress and sold by J. Bell, 1792); 5 eds by 1794; also a Dublin edn in one vol., translated into French and German (1793).
Monody to the Memory of Sir Joshua Reynolds, Late President of the Royal Academy (London: J. Bell, 1792).
An Ode to the Harp of the late accomplished and amiable Louisa Hanway (London: J. Bell, 1793).
Sight, The Cavern of Woe, and Solitude (London: printed by T. Spilsbury and sold by J. Evans, 1793).
Modern Manners: a Poem in two Cantos, by Horace Juvenal (London: printed for the Author and sold by James Evans, 1793).
Monody to the Memory of Marie Antoinette Queen of France (London: printed by T. Spilsbury and sold by H. Evans, 1793).
The Widow, or a Picture of Modern Times: A Novel in a Series of Letters, 2 vols (London: Hookham and Carpenter, 1794); also a Dublin edn in one vol.; tr. into French and German (1795); repr. as Julia St Lawrence (Leipzig, 1797).
Nobody, staged at Drury Lane, 1794, unpublished.
Angelina, a Novel, 3 vols (London: printed for the Author and sold by Hookham and Carpenter, 1796); also a Dublin edn in two vols; tr. into French (undated) and German (1799–1800).
The Sicilian Lover: a Tragedy in Five Acts (London: printed for the Author by Hookham and Carpenter, 1796).
Hubert de Sevrac: A Romance of the Eighteenth Century, 3 vols (London: printed for the Author and sold by Hookham and Carpenter, 1796); also a Dublin edn in two vols (1797); tr. into French (1797) and German (1797–8).
Sappho and Phaon, a series of legitimate Sonnets, with Thoughts on Poetical Subjects, & Anecdotes of the Grecian Poetess (London: printed by S. Gosnell for the Author, and sold by Hookham and Carpenter, 1796).
Walsingham; or, the Pupil of Nature, a Domestic Story, 4 vols (London: Longman, 1797); Dublin edn in two vols (1798); tr. into French (twice) (1798–9) and German (1799).
The False Friend, a Domestic Story, 4 vols (London: Longman and Rees, 1799); 2nd edn, 1799; tr. into French (1799) and German (1800–1).
A Letter to the Women of England, on the Injustice of Mental Subordination. With Anecdotes, by Anne Frances Randall (London: Longman and Rees, 1799); reissued later same year under Robinson’s own name with title Thoughts on the Condition of Women, and on the Injustice of Mental Subordination.
The Natural Daughter, with Portraits of the Leadenhead Family, a Novel, 2 vols (London: Longman and Rees, 1799); also a Dublin edn (1799).
Joseph Hager, Picture of Palermo, tr. from the German by Mary Robinson (London: Phillips, 1800).
Lyrical Tales (London: printed for Longman and Rees by Biggs & Cottle, Bristol, 1800).
The Mistletoe, a Christmas Tale, by Laura Maria (London: Laurie and Whittle, 1800).
Memoirs of the Late Mrs Robinson, Written by Herself, with some posthumous pieces in verse, ed. Mary Elizabeth Robinson, 4 vols (London: R. Phillips, 1801); New York and Philadelphia edns, 1802; tr. into French, 1802; vol. iii included essay series ‘The Sylphid’, novel-fragment Jasper, and poem ‘The Savage of Aveyron’; vol. iv included two-book poem ‘The Progress of Liberty’, tributary poems and poetic correspondence, letters from ‘Peter Pindar’ (John Wolcot) and Sir Joshua Reynolds. Memoirs repr. without ‘posthumous pieces’, 1803, 1827.
The Wild Wreath, ed. Mary E. Robinson (London: Richard Phillips, 1804).
The Poetical Works of the Late Mrs Robinson, including many pieces never before published, ed. Mary E. Robinson, 3 vols (London: Phillips, 1806); repr. as Poetical Works of the Late Mrs Robinson, including the pieces last published. The three volumes complete in one (London: Jones, 1824).
Many individual poems and essays in newspapers and magazines remain uncollected, among them the series of articles on the ‘Present State of the Manners, Society, etc. etc. of the Metropolis of England’ and the ‘Anecdotes’ of Lauzun, Chartres, and Marie Antoinette, all published in the Monthly Magazine between Feb. and Nov. 1800.
MODERN EDITIONS
A Letter to the Women of England and The Natural Daughter, ed. Sharon Setzer (Peterborough, Ont., 2003); there is also a facsimile of A Letter, with intro. by Jonathan Wordsworth (Oxford, 1998).
Lyrical Tales, facsimile with intro. by Jonathan Wordsworth (Oxford, 1989).
Memoirs, ed. M. J. Levy, as Perdita: The Memoirs of Mary Robinson (London, 1994).
The Natural Daughter, see A Letter, above.
Poems, 1791, facsimile with intro. by Jonathan Wordsworth (Oxford, 1994).
Poetical Works of the late Mrs Robinson, facsimile with intro. by Caroline Franklin (London, 1996).
Sappho and Phaon, there are two facsimiles with intros by Jonathan Wordsworth (Oxford, 2000) and Terence Hoagwood and Rebecca Jackson (Delmar, 1995).
Selected Poems, ed. Judith Pascoe (Peterborough, Ont., 2000).
Walsingham; or, the Pupil of Nature, ed. Julie Shaffer (Peterborough, Ont., 2003); there is also a facsimile with intro. by Peter Garside (London, 1992).
Selected ‘Laura Maria’ poems are repr. in British Satire 1785–1840, vol. iv: Gifford and the Della Cruscans, ed. John Strachan (London, 2003).
INTERNET EDITIONS
1791 Poems:
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/robinson/1791/1791.html
A Letter to the Women of England:
http://www.rc.umd.edu/editions/contemps/robinson/cover.htm
Lyrical Tales:
http://www.lib.ucdavis.edu/English/BWRP/Works/RobiMLyric.htm
Sappho and Phaon:
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/britpo/sappho/sappho.html
Memoirs:
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/robinson/memoirs/memoirs.html
The Wild Wreath:
http://www.lib.ucdavis.edu/English/BWRP/Works/RobiMWildW.htm
MANUSCRIPTS AND ARCHIVAL MATERIALS
A disappointingly small proportion of Mary Robinson’s writings survive in her own hand. Among the manuscripts consulted in the writing of this biography were:
Anson Papers: correspondence of Prince of Wales and Mary Hamilton regarding Mrs Robinson, in the possession of Rear Admiral Sir Peter and Lady Elizabeth Anson.
Bodleian Library, Oxford: letters in Montagu manuscripts and Abinger Deposit; also references in William Godwin’s manuscript diaries.
Bristol Central Library: letter.
British Library, London: letters; MS of songs etc. for The Lucky Escape; poems in a commonplace book.
British Museum, London: engravings and caricatures in Department of Prints and Drawings, some with manuscript annotations.
Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington DC: letter; poems in a commonplace book; also references in Jane Porter’s manuscript diary.
Garrick Club, London: letters.
Harvard Theatre Collection: letters.
Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies, County Hall, Hertford: correspondence of Mary Robinson, George Prince of Wales, Lord Malden, and Lord Southampton, pertaining to financial arrangements (Capell Collection).
Houghton Library, Harvard University: letter.
Huntington Library, San Marino, California: manuscripts of The Lucky Escape and Nobody in Larpent Collection of plays submitted to Lord Chamberlain’s Office.
Liverpool Record Office: Tarleton family papers.
Pforzheimer Collection, New York Public Library: letters and other papers, including Jane Porter’s ‘Character of the late Mrs Robinson’.
Private Collections: letters in possession of two private collectors; manuscript of Memoirs and other papers, in a private collection.
Royal Archives, Windsor: account books and correspondence pertaining to annuity payable to Mary Robinson and subsequently her daughter.
Westminster Archives Centre: letter.
NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES
Analytical Review
Anti-Jacobin Review
Annual Register
British Critic
Annual Review
Critical Review
Diary
Monthly Review
English Review
Morning Chronicle
European Magazine
Morning Herald
Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser
Morning Post
General Evening Post
Morning Review
General Magazine
New Annual Register
Gentleman’s Magazine
Oracle
Lady’s Magazine
Poetical Register
Lady’s Monthly Museum
Public Advertiser
London Chronicle
Quarterly Review
London Courant
Rambler’s Magazine
London Gazette
Star
London Magazine
Sun
Monthly Magazine and British
Telegraph
Register
Town and Country Magazine
Monthly Mirror
The World
OTHER BIOGRAPHICAL SOURCES
All pre-1900 books published in London, unless otherwise stated.
The Amours of Carlo Khan (1784).
Authentic Memoirs, Memorandums, and Confessions. Taken from the Journal of his Predatorial Majesty, the King of the Swindlers [John King] (n.d.)
Bass, Robert D., The Green Dragoon: The Lives of Banastre Tarleton and Mary Robinson (1957; repr. Columbia, SC, 1973)
A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers and Other Stage Personnel in London, 1660–1800, 16 vols (Carbondale, Ill., 1984–).
Biron, Armand Louis de Gontaut, Duc de Lauzun, Memoirs of the Duc de Lauzun, trans. C. K. Scott Moncrieff (London, 1928).
Boaden, James, Memoirs of the Life of John Philip Kemble, 2 vols (1825).
——Memoirs of Mrs Siddons, 2 vols (1827).
The Budget of Love; or, Letters between Florizel and Perdita (1781).
Cameron, K. N., ed., The Shelley Circle, 2 vols (Cambridge, Mass., 1961).
Campbell, Thomas, The Life of Mrs Siddons (1832).
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, Collected Letters, ed. E. L. Griggs, vols i-ii (Oxford, 1956).
——, Poems, ed. John Beer (London, 1993).
Court and Private Life in the Time of Queen Charlotte: Being the Journals of Mrs Papendiek, ed. Delves Broughton and Mrs Vernon, 2 vols (1887).
David, Saul, Prince of Pleasure: The Prince of Wales and the Making of the Regency (London, 1998).
Devonshire, Georgiana, Duchess of, Georgiana: Extracts from the Correspondence of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, ed. Earl of Bessborough (London, 1955).
Douglas, D., The Letters and Journals of Lady Mary Coke (Edinburgh, 1888–9).
The Effusions of Love: being the Amorous Correspondence between the Amiable Florizel, and the Enchanting Perdita, in a series of letters, faithfully transcribed from the original Epistles and Billets-doux in Possession of the Editor (1784).
Egan, Pierce, The Mistress of Royalty; or, the Loves of Florizel and Perdita (1814).
Elliott, Grace Dalrymple, Journal of my Life during the French Revolution (1859).
Fenwick, Eliza, Fate of the Fenwicks: Letters to Mary Hays (1798–1828), ed. A. F. Wedd (London, 1927).
Fergus, Jan and J. F. Thaddeus, ‘Women, Publishers, and Money, 1790–1820’, Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture, 17 (1987), 191–207.
The Festival of Wit (15th edn, 1789).
Fitzgerald, Percy, The Lives of the Sheridans, 2 vols (1886).
Fyvie, John, Comedy Queens of the Georgian Era (London, 1906).
Garrick, David, Florizel and Perdita. A Dramatic Pastoral, in Three Acts. Alter’d from The Winter’s Tale of Shakespear (1758).
Genest, John, Some Account of the English Stage 1660–1830, 10 vols (Bath, 1832).
George III, King, Correspondence of George III 1760-December 1783, ed. Sir John Fortescue, 6 vols (London, 1927–8).
——, The Later Correspondence of George III, ed. A. Aspinall, 5 vols (Cambridge, 1938).
George IV, King, The Correspondence of George, Prince of Wales 1770–1812, ed. A. Aspinall, 8 vols (London, 1963–71).
——, The Letters of King George IV 1812–1830, ed. A. Aspinall, 3 vols (Cambridge, 1938).
George, M. Dorothy, ed., Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires Preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum, vols v-vii (London, 1938–42).
Grego, Joseph, ‘“Perdita” and her Painters: Portraits of Mrs Mary Robinson’, The Connoisseur, February 1903, 99–107.
Griggs, Earl Leslie, ‘Coleridge and Mrs Mary Robinson’, Modern Language Notes, 45 (1930), 90–5.
Hamilton, Mary, At Court and at Home: From Letters and Diaries 1756–1816, ed. Elizabeth and Florence Anson (London, 1925).
Hanger, Colonel George, The Life, Adventures and Opinions of Colonel George Hanger, ed. W. Combe, 2 vols (1801).
Hargreaves-Mawdsley, W. N., The English Della Cruscans and their Time, 1783–1828 (The Hague, 1967).
Hartley, J., History of the Westminster Election, containing every material occurrence, from its commencement on the first of April, to the final close (1784).
Hawkins, Laetitia-Matilda, Memoirs, Facts, and Opinions, 2 vols (1824).
Hibbert, Ch
ristopher, George IV: Prince of Wales (London, 1972).
Huish, Robert, Memoirs of George the Fourth, 2 vols (1831).
Ingamells, John, Mrs Robinson and her Portraits (London, 1978).
Leslie, C. R. and T. Taylor, The Life and Times of Sir Joshua Reynolds, 2 vols (1865).
Letters from Perdita to a Certain Israelite, and his Answers to them (1781).
Levy, M. J., ‘Coleridge, Mary Robinson and Kubla Khan’, Charles Lamb Bulletin, 77 (1992), 156–66.
——, ‘Gainsborough’s Mrs Robinson: A Portrait and its Context’, Apollo, 136 (1992), 152–5.
——, The Mistresses of King George IV (London, 1996).
The London Stage 1660–1800, ed. William van Lennep, Emmett L. Avery, A. H. Scouten, G. W. Stone Jr, and C. B. Hogan, 12 vols (Carbondale, Ill., 1965–79).
The Memoirs of Perdita (1784).
Paul, C. Kegan, William Godwin: His Friends and Contemporaries, 2 vols (1876).
Pigott, Charles, The Female Jockey Club; or, a Sketch of the Manners of the Age (1792).
——The Whig Club; or, a Sketch of Modern Patriotism (1794).
Poetical Epistle from Florizel to Perdita: with Perdita’s Answer. And a Preliminary Discourse upon the Education of Princes (1781).
Polwhele, Richard, The Unsex’d Females: A Poem (1798).
Porter, Roy, Quacks: Fakers and Charlatans in English Medicine (Stroud, Glos, 2000).