Key People
Henry Mackenzie (1745-1831)
Henry Mackenzie was a lawyer and author from Edinburgh.
He wrote a number of sentimental novels, including ‘The man of feeling’ (1771), which became one of the most popular novels of the 1770s and was translated into French, German, Polish and Swedish. He later supported of a new generation of Scottish writers like Robert Burns and Walter Scott by giving recommendations and advice to publishers, or writing favourable reviews of their work.
Royal Society of Edinburgh
Mackenzie was a founding member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He was also active in the Highland Society of Scotland, where he chaired the committee commissioned to investigate the authenticity of the poems of Ossian.
Image: ‘Henry Mackenzie’, by Sir Henry Raeburn, circa 1810. By courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery.
