HOME, Anne

As a young woman she had gained some note as a lyrical poet, her "Flower of the Forest" appearing in The Lark, an Edinburgh periodical, in 1765. Thirty-two years later she wrote "Sports of the Genii" to a set of graceful drawings by Susan Macdonald (d. 1803), eldest daughter of Lord-chief-baron Macdonald; these display humour and fancy. She published a volume of poems in 1802 which ran to a second edition the following year. The conservative magazine British Critic suggests that her poems show no depth of thought, but have a natural feeling and simplicity of expression, which make many of them worth reading.

Haydn set a number of her songs to music, including "My Mother bids me bind my Hair," originally written to an air of Pleyel's. Her relationship with Haydn is ambiguous, though at the time of his visit she was a widow. Songs by Haydn on her texts include The Mermaid's Song, Fidelity, Pleasing Pain, and The Spirit's Song and a libretto for The Creation, which was based on John Milton's Paradise Lost.