Author: Roberts, Radagunda
Biography:
ROBERTS, Radagunda alternatively Radegunda, Radiganda (b c. 1728 d 1788: ODNB)
pseudonyms R.; R./R; /R.R.
No birth or baptismal record has been located for the poet. She was the eldest of the two daughters of merchant William Roberts of Bristol, originally of Abergavenny, Monmouthshire, and his wife, Margaret. She and her sister, Elizabeth Beata Roberts, lived in London with their brother Richard (1729-1823), the longest-serving high master of St Paul’s school. Her youngest brother, William (q.v.), was a teacher at Wandsworth, London. There were other notable members of her extended family: her nephew William Hayward Roberts (q.v.) was provost of Eton from 1781; her niece Margaret Roberts, whose book Telescope; or Moral Views for Children Amelie Opie praised at length in Gentleman’s Magazine, was, with her sister Mary, a friend of Hannah More (q.v.). More’s Sir Eldred of the Bower inspired the poet’s 1783 volume, Albert, Edward, Laura, and the Hermit of Priestland. Her earliest known book was her translation of Marmontel’s Contes Moraux, published in 1763 as Select Moral Tales by a Lady. She also authored Sermons Written by a Lady (1770) and a blank-verse tragedy, Malcolm (1779). Her most admired works are translations from the French: Elements of the History of France (1771); Peruvian Letters (1774); and The Triumph of Truth (1775). Besides these publications, her main literary activity was the more than eighty anonymous and pseudonymous contributions she made to Lady’s Magazine. Her place in the bluestocking literary circle of Elizabeth Montagu has recently come into view. She so doted on Dr. John Hawkesworth (d 1773), editor of Cook’s Voyages, that she wished to be buried alongside him. She died in London, probably at her brother’s house, on 14 Jan. 1788, and was buried on 21 Jan. at St Mary, Newington, Southwark. (ODNB 13 Mar. 2024, “Roberts, R. (c. 1728-1788)”; ancestry.com 14 Mar. 2024; MR 69 [Oct. 1783], 342; GM 58 [1788], 85; E. W. Pitcher, “The Miscellaneous Periodical Works and Translations of Miss R. Roberts,” Literary Research Newsletter 5:3 [1980], 125-28; M. S. Kaplan, Translations and Continuations: Ricoboni and Brooke, Graffigny and Roberts [2011]; J. Batchelor, The Lady’s Magazine (1770-1832) and the Making of Literary History [2022], 143-55) JC
Other Names:
- R. Roberts