Author: Rannie, John
Biography:
RANNIE, John (b c. 1760-d c. 1807: N&Q)
A manuscript inscription in a copy of the 1789 edition of his Poems states that he was a Scotsman working as a journeyman in Taylor’s bookshop at 10 Holborn. A 1789 ad for his Poems describes him as "late of Aberdeen." Was he the John Rannie who was imprisoned in Aberdeen in 1787 for receiving books stolen from a bookseller's? BBA says that he worked in Scotland as a butler for Mr Allardice of Allardice, moved to London where he fell into dissipation, and wrote for the Drury Lane theatre. His The Highland Lassie, a musical drama in one act, dates from this period, in 1803; a manuscript of the drama, called "The Lowland Lassie," survives in the Huntington Library. His possible birth and death dates come from a brief notice of him by Robert Murdoch Lawrance in N&Q. Lawrance’s book, John Rannie, Aberdeen: Dramatist, Poet, Song Writer (1930), has not been seen. Rannie wrote for periodicals, including the Aberdeen Magazine, and published some of his poems as broadsides. His bibliography is complicated: the 1789 edition of Poems includes his pastorals which were published separately as a second edition in 1790. The 1791 second edition of Poems excludes the pastorals but includes additional poems and songs. His books were published by subscription but only Musical Dramas includes a list. Poems by him were included in volume two of Roach’s Beauties of the Modern Poets (1795); he also published verse in The Literary Magazine and British Review in 1790. (N&Q 1928; BBA; findmypast.co.uk 25 Sept. 2025; Aberdeen Journal 4 Dec. 1787, 10 Aug. 1789) SR