Re Joanna Baillie
Judy’s chat article last week reminded me of the Literary Hour I did on Joanna Baillie way back in 2011 (I think!).
I’d never heard of her until I did one of the excellent ‘Tomb Trails’ being run during the conservation project by Camden & the Heritage Lottery fund. When the tour guide mentioned that Byron, Walter Scott and many other leading writers declared Joanna Baillie Britain’s best dramatic writer since Shakespeare, I knew she needed to be explored – immediately!
So, Internet to the rescue – it’s amazing what you can find in its obscure corners, using Google scholar. Here’s a very brief introduction to her childhood.
She was born on September 11th 1762 in the manse at Bothwell in South Lanarkshire. Her father, James, a Scottish Presbyterian minister, claimed among his ancestors the nationalist Sir William Wallace. Her mother, Dorothea Hunter (also buried in our churchyard), was descended from the Laird of Ayrshire. Joanna’s aunt was the poet Anne Hunter and her uncles were the noted royal surgeons William and John Hunter. So Joanna imbibed both creative talent and intellectual stimulus from the start. She was born a twin, but her twin sister died shortly after birth. She had an older sister, Agnes & a brother Matthew.
Joanna’s first teacher was her father, who was strong on ethics, but rather neglected the three R’s. She was composing verses before she could read, and apparently astonished everyone by the amusing tales she invented.
When she was six, the family moved to Hamilton. Then, at aged ten, she was sent to boarding school in Glasgow, where she excelled in music, art, mathematics and reading and where she took to entertaining friends by telling stories and organizing her own theatrical shows. Clearly a talented child.
Below is an unattributed portrait published in The Scotsman on 11th September 2018, Joanna Baillie’s 256th Birthday when she received the ultimate 21st century accolade – a Google Doodle on her birthday
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Further instalments to follow … watch this space.