A prizewinning dramatist in the early 1830s, Robert Montgomery Bird turned to fiction in the middle of the decade and produced historical romances about the American frontier and satirical romances in which he examines American culture. A writer with wit, tragic sensibilities, dramatic instincts, and extensive knowledge of American history, Bird won both popular and critical acclaim during his lifetime. His work, however, has since received little scholarly attention.

A descendant of a prominent Delaware family, Bird was born on 5 February 1806 and raised with the social and intellectual advantages of wealth in New Castle, Delaware. However, the death of his father, John Dearborn Bird, when Bird was only four precipitated a difficult passage into adulthood. As is shown by an autobiographical section of Bird's last novel, The Adventures of Robin Day (1839), the harsh corporal punishments that the young man endured at the New Castle Academy were not forgotten...