Mary Robinson and the Poet Coleridge

Abstract

This chapter offers further evidence for reading the friendship and creative reciprocity between Coleridge and Mary Robinson against the backdrop of Coleridge’s traumatic feelings of rejection by Wordsworth. The chapter starts off with a discussion of the references to ‘Sappho’ and her lover ‘Alcaeus’ in the headnote to the publication of ‘The Solitude of Binnorie’. A month later, on 24 November 1800, the publication of ‘Alcaeus to Sappho’ refers again to a connection between Mary Robinson and Wordsworth. In addition, the chapter explores how Robinson’s ‘Ode to Derwent’ celebrated Coleridge’s neglected poetic genius, and I also suggest that ‘Mrs Robinson to the Poet Coleridge’ was intended for publication in the Morning Post as a boost for Coleridge’s morale. The chapter concludes with a discussion of Coleridge’s ‘A Stranger Minstrel’, showing its relevance to Coleridge’s appreciation of Mary Robinson and his own unhappy predicament with respect to Sara Hutchinson and his wife.