Penelope Aubin (c. 1679 – 1738?) was an English novelist, poet, and translator. She published seven novels between 1721 and 1728. Aubin published poetry in 1707 and turned to novels in 1721; she translated French works in the 1720s, spoke publicly on moral and political issues at her Lady's Oratory in 1729, and wrote a play in 1730. Aubin died in April 1738, survived by her husband until his death in April 1740. After the author's death, her works were gathered and published as A Collection of Entertaining Histories and Novels, Designed to Promote the Cause of Virtue and Honor. Aubin's works have a long history after her death, being both plagiarised and published transatlantically. She is one of a number of eighteenth-century women writers whose works and biography are being more rigorously explored by modern scholars.

Early life

Penelope Aubin née Charleton's exact birth date remains unknown; she was the illegitimate daughter of Sir Richard Temple of Stowe and most likely born in London around 1679. While scholars in the past had theorized from the 'evidence' of her novels that she was both Catholic and Huguenot, more recently her biographers, Debbie Welham and Joel H. Baer, have identified that her husband's family were from Jersey in the Channel Islands with Huguenot links, her Charleton roots were English and staunchly Anglican. She was the daughter of Sir Richard Temple and Anne Charleton. Her mother Anne was the daughter of the physician and natural philosopher Walter Charleton. Aubin married her husband, Abraham Aubin, without the permission of either set of parents in 1696, and they had three children: Marie, Abraham, and Penelope, none outlived their parents. Aubin managed the family business while her husband, a merchant, fought in Queen Anne's wars (he gives a description of his military career in Aubin's obituary in 1738). Aubin was asked to be involved with a scheme by former pirate John Breholt to raise a petition in support of the repatriation of the pirates of Madagascar (and their wealth) to England; she declined to do so and her 1709 testimony to the Board of Trade enquiry regarding Breholt's character helped discredit Breholt's plans.

Works