Robert Burns (25 January 1759 – 21 July 1796)

By Umakhanova L. 4course

Robert Burns (25 January 1759 – 21 July 1796)

• (also known as Robbie Burns, Rabbie Burns, Scotland's favourite son, the Ploughman Poet, Robden of Solway Firth, the Bard of Ayrshire and in Scotland as The Bard) was a Scottish poet and lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland and is celebrated worldwide. He is the best known of the poets who have written in the Scots language, although much of his writing is also in English and a light Scots dialect, accessible to an audience beyond Scotland. He also wrote in standard English, and in these writings his political or civil commentary is often at its bluntest.

He is regarded as a pioneer of the Romantic movement

• and after his death he became a great source of inspiration to the founders of both liberalism and socialism, and a cultural icon in Scotland and among the Scottish Diaspora around the world. Celebration of his life and work became almost a national charismatic cult during the 19th and 20th centuries, and his influence has long been strong on Scottish literature. In 2009 he was chosen as the greatest Scot by the Scottish public in a vote run by Scottish television channel STV.

Poems and songs by Burns

• As well as making original compositions, Burns also collected folk songs from across Scotland, often revising or adapting them. His poem (and song) "Auld Lang Syne" is often sung at Hogmanay (the last day of the year), and "Scots Wha Hae" served for a long time as an unofficial national anthem of the country. Other poems and songs of Burns that remain well known across the world today include "A Red, Red Rose"; "A Man's a Man for A' That"; "To a Louse"; "To a Mouse"; "The Battle of Sherramuir"; "Tam o' Shanter"; and "Ae Fond Kiss".

Kilmarnock Edition

• As Burns lacked the funds to pay for his passage to the West Indies, Gavin Hamilton suggested that he should "publish his poems in the mean time by subscription, as a likely way of getting a little money to provide him more liberally in necessaries for Jamaica." On 3 April Burns sent proposals for publishing his Scotch Poems to John Wilson, a local printer in Kilmarnock, who published these proposals on 14 April 1786

• On 31 July 1786 John Wilson published the volume of works by Robert Burns, Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish dialect. Known as the Kilmarnock volume, it sold for 3 shillings and contained much of his best writing, including "The Twa Dogs", "Address to the Deil", "Halloween", "The Cotter's Saturday Night", "To a Mouse", "Epitaph for James Smith", and "To a Mountain Daisy", many of which had been written at Mossgiel farm. The success of the work was immediate, and soon he was known across the country. Burns postponed his planned emigration to Jamaica on 1 September, and was at Mossgiel two days later when he learnt that Jean Armour had given birth to twins. On 4 September Thomas Blacklock wrote a letter expressing admiration for the poetry in the Kilmarnock volume, and suggesting an enlarged second edition. A copy of it was passed to Burns

Edinburgh• On 27 November 1786 Burns borrowed

a pony and set out for Edinburgh. On 14 December William Creech issued subscription bills for the first Edinburgh edition of Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish dialect, which was published on 17 April 1787. Within a week of this event, Burns had sold his copyright to Creech for 100 guineas.For the edition, Creech commissioned Alexander Nasmyth to paint the oval bust-length portrait now in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, which was engraved to provide a frontispiece for the book. Nasmyth had got to know Burns and his fresh and appealing image has become the basis for almost all subsequent representations of the poet. In Edinburgh, he was received as an equal by the city's men of letters—including Dugald Stewart, Robertson, Blair and others—and was a guest at aristocratic gatherings, where he bore himself with unaffected dignity. Here he encountered, and made a lasting impression on, the 16-year-old Walter Scott

Lyricist

• On his return to Ayrshire on 18 February 1788 he resumed his relationship with Jean Armour and took a lease on the farm of Ellisland near Dumfries on 18 March (settling there on 11 June) but trained as a Gauger or exciseman, in case farming continued to prove unsuccessful. After giving up his farm he removed to Dumfries. It was at this time that, being requested to write lyrics for The Melodies of Scotland, he responded by contributing over 100 songs. He made major contributions to George Thomson's A Select Collection of Original Scottish Airs for the Voice as well as to James Johnson's Scots Musical Museum. Arguably his claim to immortality chiefly rests on these volumes, which placed him in the front rank of lyric poets.

Literary style

• Burns's style is marked by spontaneity, directness, and sincerity, and ranges from the tender intensity of some of his lyrics through the humour of "Tam o' Shanter" and the satire of "Holy Willie's Prayer" and "The Holy Fair".Burns's poetry drew upon a substantial familiarity with and knowledge of Classical, Biblical, and English literature, as well as the Scottish Makar tradition. Burns was skilled in writing not only in the Scots language but also in the Scottish English dialect of the English language. Some of his works, such as "Love and Liberty" (also known as "The Jolly Beggars"), are written in both Scots and English for various effects.

• The strong emotional highs and lows

associated with many of Burns's poems have led some, such as Burns biographer Robert Crawford, to suggest that he suffered from manic depression—a hypothesis that has been supported by analysis of various samples of his handwriting. Burns himself referred to suffering from episodes of what he called "blue devilism". However, the National Trust for Scotland has downplayed the suggestion on the grounds that evidence is insufficient to support the claim. His themes included republicanism (he lived during the French Revolutionary period) and Radicalism, which he expressed covertly in "Scots Wha Hae", Scottish patriotism, anticlericalism, class inequalities, gender roles, commentary on the Scottish Kirk of his time, Scottish cultural identity, poverty, sexuality, and the beneficial aspects of popular socialising (carousing, Scotch whisky, folk songs, and so forth).

InfluenceBritain

• Burns is generally classified as a proto-Romantic poet, and he influenced William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Percy Bysshe Shelley greatly. His direct literary influences in the use of Scots in poetry were Allan Ramsay and Robert Fergusson. The Edinburgh literati worked to sentimentalise Burns during his life and after his death, dismissing his education by calling him a "heaven-taught ploughman". Burns influenced later Scottish writers, especially Hugh MacDiarmid, who fought to dismantle what he felt had become a sentimental cult that dominated Scottish literature.

Canada

• Burns had a significant influence on Alexander McLachlan and some influence on Robert Service. While this may not be so obvious in Service's English verse, which is Kiplingesque, it is more readily apparent in his Scots verse. Scottish Canadians have embraced Robert Burns as a kind of patron poet and mark his birthday with festivities. 'Robbie Burns Day' is celebrated from Newfoundland and Labrador to Nanaimo. Every year, Canadian newspapers publish biographies of the poet, listings of local events and buffet menus. Universities mark the date in a range of ways: McMaster University library organized a special collection and Simon Fraser University's Centre for Scottish Studies organized a marathon reading of Burns' poetry). Senator Heath Macquarrie quipped of Canada's first Prime Minister that "While the lovable [Robbie] Burns went in for wine, women and song, his fellow Scot, John A. did not chase women and was not musical!" 'Gung Haggis Fat Choy' is a hybrid of Chinese New Year and Robbie Burns Day, celebrated in Vancouver since the late 1990s.

United States• In January 1864, President Abraham

Lincoln was invited to attend a Robert Burns celebration by Robert Crawford; and if unable to attend, send a toast. Lincoln composed a toast. An example of Burns's literary influence in the U.S. is seen in the choice by novelist John Steinbeck of the title of his 1937 novel, Of Mice and Men, taken from a line in the second-to-last stanza of "To a Mouse": "The best laid schemes o' mice an' men / Gang aft agley." Burns's influence on American vernacular poets such as James Whitcomb Riley and Frank Lebby Stanton has been acknowledged by their biographers. When asked for the source of his greatest creative inspiration, singer songwriter Bob Dylan selected Burns's 1794 song "A Red, Red Rose" as the lyric that had the biggest effect on his life.[The author J. D. Salinger used protagonist Holden Caulfield's misinterpretation of Burns's poem "Comin' Through the Rye" as his title and a main interpretation of Caulfield's grasping to his childhood in his 1951 novel The Catcher in the Rye. The poem, actually about a rendezvous, is thought by Caulfield to be about saving people from falling out of childhood.

Russia• Burns became the "people's poet" of

Russia. In Imperial Russia Burns was translated into Russian and became a source of inspiration for the ordinary, oppressed Russian people. In Soviet Russia, he was elevated as the archetypal poet of the people. As a great admirer of the egalitarian ethos behind the American and French Revolutions who expressed his own egalitarianism in poems such as his "Birthday Ode for George Washington" or his "Is There for Honest Poverty" (commonly known as "A Man's a Man for a' that"), Burns was well placed for endorsement by the Communist regime as a "progressive" artist. A new translation of Burns begun in 1924 by Samuil Marshak proved enormously popular, selling over 600,000 copies. The USSR honoured Burns with a commemorative stamp in 1956. He remains popular in Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union

Failing health and death

• Robert Burns Mausoleum at St. Michael's churchyard in Dumfries. His political views also came to the notice of his employers and in an attempt to prove his loyalty to the Crown, Burns joined the Royal Dumfries Volunteers in March 1795. As his health began to give way, he began to age prematurely and fell into fits of despondency. The habits of intemperance (alleged mainly by temperance activist James Currie)are said to have aggravated his long-standing possible rheumatic heart condition. His death followed a dental extraction in winter 1795. On the morning of 21 July 1796 Burns died in Dumfries, at the age of 37. His body was eventually moved to its location in the same cemetery, the Burns Mausoleum, in September 1815.

Robert BurnsBirthplace Museum

• Robert Burns Birthplace Museum offers a truly unique encounter with Scotland’s favourite son. Set among 10 acres of the poet’s cherished Alloway countryside, the museum comprises the famous Burns Cottage where the poet was born, the historic landmarks where he set his greatest work, the elegant monument and gardens created in his honour and a modern museum housing the world’s most important collection of his life and works.

The Birthplace collectionContaining goose-quill nibs, a sharpening knife and a tiny inkwell, Robert carried this writing set with him as he travelled through the countryside. The poet was fond of quoting another writer, Thomas Gray, in thinking ‘a word fix’d on the spot is worth a cart-load of recollection’ and these tools of his trade would have helped him do this on country walks, or while working in the open air.

Holy fairs were twice-yearly open-air events that aimed to prepare the righteous for Communion. The people in the centre of the painting are caught in a moral tug-of-war between the kirk (left) and the pub (right). Robert Burns is pictured on the right of the painting walking arm-in-arm with ‘Fun’ (dressed in white), leaving ‘Superstition’ and ‘Hypocrisy’ (cloaked in black and gripping a prayer book) to go their own miserable way.

Wylie’s interests include Robert Burns and shipping, and both have been combined in this tongue-in-cheek sculpture by the Gourock-based artist. The ship or ‘liner’ has a cargo of shortbread tins bearing a portrait of the poet, and a Burns quote or ‘line’ on happiness painted onto the side of the tins, ‘Whatever mitigates the woes or increases the happiness of others, this is my criterion of goodness; and whatever injures society at large, or any individual in it, this is my measure of iniquity’.

From the age of 30 until his death seven years later, Robert Burns was an exciseman. Taking taxes on goods such malted grain, alcohol, paper, and soap was unpopular and the job of the exciseman or gauger was a risky business. For this reason Burns carried these pistols which are personalised with his initials.

Alloway’s link to Burns has attracted artists for over two centuries. Burns Monument and the Brig o’ Doon, painted here by David Roberts, were both iconic sites by the mid-19th century. Roberts, who spent much of his career depicting the architecture of the Near East, North Africa and Italy, focussed on buildings closer to home in his final years.

This is the only surviving sheet, out of 96 printed, advertising the proposal to print ‘Scotch Poems’ by Robert Burns. Reassured by promises to buy 350 books, John Wilson printed almost double that number in July 1786. Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect sold like hot cakes! Burns has scored off subscribers’ names, no doubt following-up on promises to buy his book. In all, 16 people have agreed to buy 20 books but one name hasn’t honoured their promise. Beside William Lorimer’s name Burns notes ‘The Blockhead refused it’.

This manuscript records one of Burns’s best known works, Tam o’ Shanter. Robert handwrote several copies of Tam o’ Shanter to send to his friends. This version of the poem is unusual because it includes four lines that speak harshly about lawyers and priests. Robert was advised to remove these lines before publication. The main scenes of the poem take place at two Alloway landmarks: the Auld Kirk, and Brig o’ Doon.

This cast of Burns’s skull was made in 1834 when his grave was opened to admit his wife’s body. Phrenologists – now considered pseudo-scientists – believed a skull’s shape and dimensions revealed its owner’s personality. Phrenologist George Combe studied the cast of Burns’s skull and concluded that he had an ‘extremely active brain’ and skills in languages and mathematics. This report shows the fascination with Robert’s personality, only 37 years after his death.

Burns is often depicted wearing a waistcoat. These six polished agate spheres are fastening buttons which once adorned such a garment. The markings on some agates resemble cat’s eyes. At the time of Burns, agates were worn by some to protect against the evil eye, and by others to make themselves ‘agreeable and persuasive’. Which reason do you think would have appealed to Burns?

Burns key dates 

• 1759 Born in Alloway on 25 January• 1765–8 Burnes family move to Mount Oliphant Farm, near Alloway• 1766 Burnes family move to Mount Oliphant Farm, near Alloway• 1774 Writes his first song, O once I lov’d [a bonnie lass]• 1777 Burnes family move to Lochlea Farm, near Tarbolton• 1781 Becomes a Freemason• 1781 Moves to Irvine to learn flax-dressing (preparing flax so it can

be made into linen)• 1784 His father, William Burnes, dies. The family move to Mossgiel

Farm, near Mauchline• 1784 The family change their name to Burns• 1785 Meets Jean Armour. Becomes a father for the first time, to

Elizabeth, born to maidservant Elizabeth Paton• 1785–6 Has an affair with Margaret Campbell (‘Highland Mary’)• 1786 The first edition of Burns’s Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish

Dialect is published in Kilmarnock• 1786 Abandons plans to emigrate to Jamaica to work on a slave

plantation. Instead, travels to Edinburgh to look into publishing a second edition of his poems

• 1786 Enters into ‘a form of wedlock’ with Jean Armour• 1786 Becomes a father to twins Robert and Jean Burns, born to Jean

Armour

• 1787 Second edition of poems is published in Edinburgh. Meets James Johnson and agrees to contribute to The Scots Musical Museum

• 1787 Tours the Highlands, Stirlingshire and the Borders, collecting local songs and airs

• 1787 Becomes a father to a child, born to Edinburgh servant girl May Cameron

• 1787 Meets Agnes McLehose (‘Clarinda’)

• 1788 Marriage to Jean Armour is officially recognised by the Kirk

• 1788 Becomes a father to twin daughters, born to Jean

• 1788 Moves to Ellisland Farm, near Dumfries

• 1788 Becomes a father to Robert, born to Edinburgh serving maid Jenny Clow

• 1789 Becomes a father to Francis Wallace Burns, born to Jean

• 1789 Begins work as an Excise officer

• 1790 Writes Tam o’ Shanter

• 1791 Becomes a father to Elizabeth (‘Betty’), born to barmaid Anna Park

• 1791 Moves to Dumfries

• 1791 Becomes a father to William Nicol Burns, born to Jean

• 1792 Becomes a father to Elizabeth Riddell Burns, born to Jean

• 1792 Begins work on A Select Collection of Original Scotish Airs with George Thomson

• 1794 Becomes a father to James Glencairn Burns, born to Jean

• 1796 Dies in Dumfries, at the age of 37

• 1796 Robert’s youngest son, Maxwell Burns, is born to Jean on the day of the poet’s funeral. Jean is unable to attend the funeral service