John Aikin (15 January 1747 – 7 December 1822) was an English medical doctor and surgeon. Later in life he devoted himself wholly to biography and writing in periodicals.
In 1792, one of his pamphlets having given offence, he moved to London, where he practised as a consulting physician. He lived in Church Street, Stoke Newington. However, he concerned himself more with the advocacy of liberty of conscience than with his professional duties, and he began at an early period to devote himself to literary pursuits, to which his contributions were incessant. When Richard Phillips founded The Monthly Magazine in 1796, Aikin was its first editor. In conjunction with his sister, Anna Laetitia Barbauld, he published a popular series of volumes entitled Evenings at Home (6 vols, 1792–1795), for elementary family reading, which were translated into almost every European language.[1]
Essay on the application of natural history to poetry, 1777
In 1798 Aikin retired altogether from medicine and devoted himself to literary undertakings such as his General Biography (10 vols, 1799–1815). His other work included Biographical Memoirs of Medicine in Great Britain (1780),The Arts of Life... described in a series of letters. For the instruction of young persons (1802, reprinted 1807), and The Lives of John Selden, Esq., and Archbishop Usher (1812).[1][2]
Apart from editing The Monthly Magazine (1796–1807) and Dodsley's Annual Register (1811–1815),[3] Aikin produced a paper called The Athenaeum in 1807–1809, not to be confused with the well-known magazine The Athenaeum (1828–1921).[4]
Aikin had four children, three sons and a daughter.[5] The eldest son, Arthur, was a prominent scientist, and the youngest, Edmund, an architect.[6] The second son, Charles, was adopted by Aikin's sister, who had no children. Through Charles, Aikin was grandfather to the writer Anna Letitia Le Breton. His daughter Lucy was a biographer, who in 1823 published Memoir of John Aikin, M.D., with a selection of Miscellaneous Pieces, Biographical, Moral and Critical.[7]
^Aikin, Lucy (2010). "Lucy Aikin: A Brief Chronology". In Mellor, Anne K.; Michelle Levy (eds.). Epistles on Women and Other Works. Broadview Editions. ISBN9781770481244.
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Aikin, John". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 437.
Gilman, D. C.; Peck, H. T.; Colby, F. M., eds. (1905). "Aikin, John". New International Encyclopedia (1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Cousin, John William (1910). A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. London: J. M. Dent & Sons – via Wikisource.
