Mary Robinson (née Darby; 27 November 1757 – 26 December 1800) was an English actress, poet, dramatist, novelist, and celebrity figure.

Robinson was born in Bristol, England to Nicholas Darby, a naval captain, and his wife Hester (née Vanacott) who had married at Donyatt, Somerset, in 1749, and was baptised 'Polle(y)' ("Spelt 'Polle' in the official register and 'Polly' in the Bishop's Transcript") at St Augustine's Church, Bristol, 19 July 1758,[3] the entry noting that she was born on 27 November 1756.

[13] Robinson noted, "My tutor [David Garrick] was the most sanguine in his expectations of my success, and every rehearsal seemed to strengthen his flattering opinion...

Mary was against this idea; however, after falling ill and watching him take care of her and her younger brother, she felt that she owed him, and she did not want to disappoint her mother who was pushing for the engagement.

After her husband squandered their money, the couple fled to Talgarth, Breconshire (where Robinson's only daughter, Mary Elizabeth, was born in November 1784).

[15] It was in the Fleet Prison that Robinson's literary career really began, as she found that she could publish poetry to earn money, and to give her an escape from the harsh reality that had become her life.

[16] Additionally, Robinson's husband was offered work in the form of copying legal documents so he could try to pay back some of his debts, but he refused to do anything.

Robinson, in an effort to keep the family together and to get back to normal life outside of prison, took the job instead, collecting the pay that her husband neglected to earn.

The renowned playwright, author, and Member of Parliament, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, demonstrated significant support for Robinson.

[17] Robinson was best known for her facility with the 'breeches parts', and her performances as Viola in William Shakespeare'sTwelfth Night and Rosalind in As You Like It won her extensive praise.

[citation needed] With her new social prominence, Robinson became a trend-setter in London, introducing a loose, flowing muslin style of gown based upon Grecian statuary that became known as the Perdita.

[20] "Perdita" Robinson was left to support herself through an annuity promised by the Crown (but rarely paid), in return for some letters written by the Prince, and through her writings.

[22] Mary Robinson, who now lived separately from her husband, went on to have several love affairs, most notably with Banastre Tarleton, a soldier who had recently distinguished himself fighting in the American War of Independence.

Unfortunately for Malden, Tarleton accepted the bet and swooped in to not only seduce Robinson, but establish a relationship that would last the next 15 years.

Biographer Paula Byrne speculates that a streptococcal infection resulting from a miscarriage led to a severe rheumatic fever that left her disabled for the rest of her life.

In addition to poems, she wrote eight novels, three plays, feminist treatises, and an autobiographical manuscript that was incomplete at the time of her death.

The earliest known, drawn by James Roberts II, depicts "Mrs. Robinson in the Character of Amanda" from Cibber's Love's Last Shift in 1777.

The books were "sold out by lunch time on the first day and five more editions quickly followed, making it one of the top-selling novels in the latter part of the eighteenth century.

In addition to maintaining literary and cultural notability, she has re-attained a degree of celebrity in recent years when several biographies of her appeared, including one by Paula Byrne entitled Perdita: The Literary, Theatrical, and Scandalous Life of Mary Robinson that became a top-10 best-seller after being selected for the Richard & Judy Book Club.

[30] From the late 1780s, Robinson, striving to separate herself from her past scandals, and life as a theatre actress, turned to writing as a full-time career.

In addition to eight collections of poems, Robinson wrote eight novels, three plays, feminist treatises, and an autobiographical manuscript that was incomplete at the time of her death.

[31] Motivated by the months she spent in prison, Robinson wrote Captivity; a Poem and Celadon and Lydia, a Tale, published by T. Becket in London, in 1777.

She employed characters such as the chimney-boy, and ruddy housemaid to make a heavy critique on the way English society treated children as both innocent and fragile creatures.

[34] In 1796, Robinson argued for women's rationality, their right to education and illustrated ideas of free will, suicide, rationalisation, empiricism and relationship to sensibility in Sappho and Phaon: In a Series of Legitimate Sonnets.

Although it was not as highly praised as Mary Wollstonecraft's "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman", published in 1792, Lyrical Tales provides a "powerful critique of the division of duties and privileges between the sexes.

"[33] The collection of Poems published in 1791 had a "subscription list of 600 people was headed by His Royal Highness, George, Prince of Wales, and included many other members of the nobility.

The upper class interpreted her satire as mockery on female gambling and it was an attack on moral legitimacy of the Whig elite.

She replaced the poet Robert Southey as chief poetic correspondent and contributor for The Morning Post in December 1799, a position she maintained until November 1800, a month before her death.

[43] The poetry columns had a double agenda of pleasing a substantial and diverse audience and shaping them into a select group of elite readers eager to buy and consume books.

Furthermore, a biographer Paula Byrne recently dismissed it as a "product of the vogue for Gothic fiction [that] now seems overblown to the point of absurdity."