Born in Evanston, Illinois, Robinson graduated from Walnut Hills High School in Cincinnati and earned a BA in philosophy and English literature at Yale College in 1971.
In 1974, he published the one-shot poetry magazine Streets and Roads, where for the first time work by such poets as Barrett Watten, Ron Silliman, Rae Armantrout, and Bob Perelman appeared alongside that of Alan Bernheimer, Steve Benson, Carla Harryman, and Merrill Gilfillan.
That kind of thing did emerge, but I would argue it was never foundational.” [1] Robinson's essays on poetics, art, travel and music may be found online at Open Space, Jacket2, and Nowhere, and on his website.
In an interview with Charles Bernstein for the "Close Listening" online radio program, the two poets discuss Robinson’s early book The Dolch Stanzas with its limited vocabulary based on a list of the most frequently used words in English, as well as changes in his more recent, "late" work, his connection to Tom Raworth, and the relation of his day jobs to his work as a musician and poet.
[2] Of his book Leaves of Class, writer and translator Jessica Sequeira writes, “What Robinson seems to be looking for is a curious, timeless, approachable informality, one that is … open to influences of all kinds.” [3] Of Determination, poet and critic Tyrone Williams writes, “Steering clear of the monolithic and homogenous, Determination distributes its thematic values — will and constraint — along a number of formal axes … neither a monument to morose modernity nor a Cheshire grin of flippant postmodernity.” [4]