For the American actress born in 1917, see Marsha Hunt (actress).

Marsha Hunt (born April 15, 1946) is an African American singer and novelist.

Hunt grew up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and studied at the University of California, Berkeley (at the time of the student riots) but in the late 1960s moved to Britain. She has lived in Ireland since 1995. She also lives in France where she owns a home.

She is the mother of Mick Jagger's first child, Karis Jagger, who was born on November 4, 1970 in the UK. Marsha Hunt is the inspiration of the Stone's hit "Brown Sugar". Ms. Hunt was at the time a member of the cast in the London production of the musical Hair (playing "Dionne"), reportedly approached Jagger at a party and, rather bluntly, informed him that she wanted to have his baby. Jagger obliged her but would not enter into a long-term relationship with Hunt, who, consequently, had to bring up her daughter as a single mother (although she also wanted to make her way in show business). Jagger even denied being Karis's father and refused payments. A lengthy lawsuit followed, and a settlement making him support Hunt and their daughter was only reached in 1979. Mick Jagger has been close to Karis for years. She would often vacation with Jagger and his family as a teenager. He attended Karis's graduation from Yale, her wedding in 2000 and was at the hospital for the birth of her son in 2004. He has been very close to Karis for more than twenty years.

Hunt was also professionally associated with musicians such as Alexis Korner, John Mayall, Elton John, and Marc Bolan.

In her later years Hunt has taken to writing. After her 1986 autobiography, Real Life: The Story of a Survivor, she published her first novel, Joy, in 1990, and her second novel, Free, in 1992. In late 2004, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and had surgery to remove her right breast and her lymph nodes. She has written about it in a memoir, Undefeated, and has been the subject of a documentary, Beating Breast Cancer on ITV, broadcast on 26 September 2005.

1946 births | Living people | Breast cancer patients | Breast cancer activists