Baillie Joanna

Baillie, Joanna, born at Bothwell in Lanarkshire, in 1762, where her father, professor of divinity at Glasgow, was minister, her mother being the sister of William and John Hunter. At her father's death in 1784 she joined her brother Matthew, an eminent physician in London, and after 1800 passed the rest of her life at Hampstead. In 1798 she published the first series of her Plays of the Passions, the second following in 1802. Her dramas at once attracted notice, and were attributed to Sir Walter Scott. John Kemble produced De Montfort at Drury Lane without much success. During the next thirty years she wrote several volumes of tragedies and comedies, a few of which were acted, but only one, The Family Legend, ever attained any degree of popularity. They are deficient in plot, unreal in character, and full of false sentiment. Yet there are occasional glimpses of genuine life, and touches of poetic feeling, whilst a vein of simple humour frequently runs through the dialogues. She composed some songs of merit and several metrical legends in the style of Scott, who was one of her warmest admirers. She died in 1851.