Robert Anderson (7 January 1750 – 20 February 1830) was a Scottish author and critic.[1][2]
Son of David Anderson, W.S., he was born at Carnwath, Lanarkshire. He studied first divinity and then medicine at the University of Edinburgh, and subsequently, after some experience as a surgeon, took his M.D. at the University of St Andrews in 1778. He began to practise as a physician at Alnwick in Northumberland, but he became financially independent by his marriage with the daughter of John Gray, and abandoned his profession for a literary life in Edinburgh.[2]
For several years his attention was occupied with his edition of The Works of the British Poets, with Prefaces Biographical and Critical (14 vols. 8vo, Edin., 1792–1807).[3] His other publications were:[2]
Anderson was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1816.[4]
He was a Scottish Freemason having been Initiated in The Lodge of Holyrood House (St Luke's), No.44, in 1781.[5]
Attribution
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Anderson, Robert". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.