15 Facts About Robin Hyde

Robin Hyde, the pseudonym used by Iris Guiver Wilkinson, was a South African-born New Zealand poet, journalist and novelist.

Robin Hyde had her secondary education at Wellington Girls' College, where she wrote poetry and short stories for the school magazine.

When she was 18, Hyde suffered a knee injury which required a hospital operation.

Robin Hyde continued to support herself through journalism throughout her life.

In 1926, in Rotorua for a holiday and treatment for her tubercular knee, Robin Hyde had an affair with Frederick de Mulford Robin Hyde.

When Robin Hyde fell pregnant, Frederick paid for her to have the child in Sydney, Australia.

Traumatised by the loss of her child, Robin Hyde was hospitalised at Queen Mary Hospital in Hanmer Springs and then cared for at the family home in Wellington, though only her mother knew of the pregnancy.

Robin Hyde was engaged to write columns for the Christchurch Sun, and the Mirror.

In 1930, while working for the Wanganui Chronicle, Robin Hyde had an affair with the Marton-based journalist Harry Lawson Smith.

In time Robin Hyde's mother learned of Derek's existence, but her father was never told.

In 1929 Robin Hyde published her first book of poetry, The Desolate Star.

Robin Hyde was meant to travel to Kobe then Vladivostok to take the trans-Siberian railway to Europe.

Robin Hyde attempted to flee the area by walking along the railway lines and was eventually escorted by Japanese officials to the port city of Qingdao where she was handed over to British authorities.

Robin Hyde died by her own hand with an overdose of Benzedrine at 1 Pembridge Square, Kensington, a boarding house where she had been living.

Robin Hyde was survived by a son, Derek Challis, and was buried in the Kensington New Cemetery, at Gunnersbury.