The Poetry of Mary Robinson: Form and Fame

Bell’s Laureates II 77

of “one common idea and central form, which is the abstract of the

various individual forms belonging to that class,” as Reynolds writes in

the Third Discourse (42).^7 The artist’s imagination must comprehend

all forms of beauty particular to a class of beings. Reynolds asserts

that the painter must “vary his compositions with figures of various

forms and proportions, though he is never to lose sight of the general

idea of perfection in each kind” (44). So, in her poem “To Sir Joshua

Reynolds,” Robinson emphasizes the subtle and elegant idealizations

that result in an artistic truth rather than a realistic depiction. It is

certainly no stretch to presume that Robinson understood this much

about her own aesthetic principles and her poetic practices.

Baroque Form

The brand was thus established. On 13 August 1789, Bell touted

an exclusive relationship with the popular Laura Maria. He writes,

“LAUR A MARIA has already acquired Fame, sufficient to excite curios-

ity and impatience whenever her Productions are announced – that

Fame sprang from The ORACLE – To The ORACLE let her Productions,

and the CONSEQUENT FAME, be confined.” The word Productions is

a remarkable denotation for her poetry, as it not only emphasizes

Robinson as the producer of cultural artifacts, but also Bell’s claim on

them as his own products. For the rest of 1789, Robinson cultivated

the Laura Maria avatar as Bell did the readership of the Oracle. And

Robinson contributed a few poems under another significant avatar—

“Mrs. Robinson”—making a suitably theatrical debut in the Oracle

with “Lines Inscribed to the Memory of David Garrick, Esq.,” a tribute

to her former mentor and a public acknowledgment of her controversial

past (26 September 1789). She was preparing the public for her even-

tual revelation as the poet behind Laura Maria. Before then, Robinson

would publish as Laura Maria several odes intended to further define

the persona as a poet of great elegance and virtuosity. Most of these

continue in the allegorical vein and include odes “To Eloquence”

(5 September 1789), “To Ref lection” (7 December 1789), “To the

Nightingale” (11 December 1789), “To Melancholy” (17 December

1789), and “To Meditation” (26 December 1789). Undoubtedly sev-

eral more odes appeared in 1790 in issues of the Oracle that have been

lost; these, however, were reprinted in the 1791 volume. Other than

her “Second Ode to the Nightingale,” which is in octosyllabic cou-

plets, Robinson’s “Ode to Della Crusca” is the only one of the odes to

maintain a fixed form throughout. Appropriately, this form matches

exactly Della Crusca’s “Ode to Tranquility,” which appeared first in

9780230100251_04_ch02.indd 779780230100251_04_ch02.indd 77 12/28/2010 11:08:27 AM12/28/2010 11:08:27 AM

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