Portrait of Mary Robinson, 'Perdita' (? 1758-1800), bust-length, in a black dress and a black feathered hat, before a red curtain

Mary Robinson (née Darby) (1757-1800) was tutored by David Garrick (1717-1779) as a teenager, and was indebted to him for her introduction into the London theatre. She became known as 'Perdita' when she played the heroine in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, in 1779. It was this performance that drew her to the attention of the young Prince of Wales, later King George IV, who offered her a bond for £20,000 to become his mistress. Subsequently abandoning her theatrical career, Mrs Robinson led a notorious life of extravagance and had numerous love affairs - she was one of the most frequently painted and caricatured women of the late 18th century. Mrs Robinson also wrote novels, plays and poetry, supported by her patron Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire (1757-1806). A few months before her death, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) wrote that he 'never knew a human Being with so full a mind...bad, good, & indifferent, but full, & overflowing' (Collected Letters, ed. E.L.Griggs, Oxford, 1959, I, p. 562), and today 'Perdita' Robinson is regarded as a significant contributor to Romanticism and a pioneering feminist.
The present portrait is after the picture of 1782 in a private collection.