Robert Burns: A Life

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The Merry Muses of Caledonia: A Collection of Favorite Scots Songs, attributed to Burns as editor and contributor (Edinburgh?: Peter Hill?, 1800?); republished as The Merry Muses of Caledonia: Collected and in Part Written by Robert Burns, edited by Gershon Legman (New Hyde Park, N.Y.: University Books, 1965). 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".

The Poems and Songs of Robert Burns, 3 volumes, edited by James Kinsley (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968). William Law lived at Honresfield House in Lancashire and after his death in 1901 it passed to Alfred Law, his brother. In 1913, 116 years after it was loaned to Dr James Curry, it passed to his nephew, Sir Alfred Joseph Law, who still held it in 1938 when a full facsimile was published by Gowans and Gray of Glasgow. [17] The Letters of Robert Burns, 2 volumes, edited by J. De Lancey Ferguson (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1931); second edition, 2 volumes, edited by G. Ross Roy (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985). Burns also worked to collect and preserve Scottish folk songs, sometimes revising, expanding, and adapting them. One of the better known of these collections is The Merry Muses of Caledonia (the title is not Burns's), a collection of bawdy lyrics that were popular in the music halls of Scotland as late as the 20th century. At Dumfries, he wrote his world famous song " A Man's a Man for A' That", which was based on the writings in The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine, one of the chief political theoreticians of the American Revolution. Burns sent the poem anonymously in 1795 to the Glasgow Courier. He was also a radical for reform and wrote poems for democracy, such as – "Parcel of Rogues to the Nation" and the "Rights of Women". The Scots Musical Museum, 6 volumes, edited by Burns and James Johnson, with contributions by Burns (Edinburgh: Printed and sold by James Johnson, 1787-1803).My way is: I consider the poetic sentiment, correspondent to my idea of the musical expression, then chuse my theme, begin one stanza, when that is composed—which is generally the most difficult part of the business—I walk out, sit down now and then, look out for objects in nature around me that are in unison or harmony with the cogitations of my fancy and workings of my bosom, humming every now and then the air with the verses I have framed. when I feel my Muse beginning to jade, I retire to the solitary fireside of my study, and there commit my effusions to paper, swinging, at intervals, on the hind-legs of my elbow chair, by way of calling forth my own critical strictures, as my, pen goes. If there were a shift of emphasis and attitude toward traditional culture as a result of the Edinburgh experience, there was also continuity. Early and late Burns was a rhymer, a versifier, a local poet using traditional forms and themes in occasional and sometimes extemporaneous productions. These works are seldom noteworthy and are sometimes biting and satiric. He called them “little trifles” and frequently wrote them to “pay a debt.” These pieces were not thought of as equal to his more deliberate endeavors; they were play, increasingly expected of him as a poet. He probably would have disavowed many now attributed to him, particularly some of the mean-spirited epigrams. Several occasional pieces, however, deserve a closer look for their ability to raise the commonplace to altogether different heights.

Robert Burns was born in 1759, in Alloway, Scotland, to William and Agnes Brown Burnes. Like his father, Burns was a tenant farmer. However, toward the end of his life he became an excise collector in Dumfries, where he died in 1796; throughout his life he was also a practicing poet. His poetry recorded and celebrated aspects of farm life, regional experience, traditional culture, class culture and distinctions, and religious practice. He is considered the national poet of Scotland. Although he did not set out to achieve that designation, he clearly and repeatedly expressed his wish to be called a Scots bard, to extol his native land in poetry and song, as he does in “The Answer”: Ceremonies & Events: Robbie Burns Day". Simon Fraser University. January 2013. Archived from the original on 2 February 2014 . Retrieved 27 January 2013. Burns was posthumously given the freedom of the town of Dumfries. [33] Hogg records that Burns was given the freedom of the Burgh of Dumfries on 4 June 1787, 9 years before his death, and was also made an Honorary Burgess of Dumfries. [43] His house in Dumfries is operated as the Robert Burns House, and the Robert Burns Centre in Dumfries features more exhibits about his life and works. Ellisland Farm in Auldgirth, which he owned from 1788 to 1791, is maintained as a working farm with a museum and interpretation centre by the Friends of Ellisland Farm. Robert Burns was initiated into the Masonic lodge St David, Tarbolton, on 4 July 1781, when he was 22. In December 1781, Burns moved temporarily to Irvine to learn to become a flax-dresser, but during the workers' celebrations for New Year 1781/1782 (which included Burns as a participant) the flax shop caught fire and was burnt to the ground. This venture accordingly came to an end, and Burns went home to Lochlea farm. [6] During this time he met and befriended Richard Brown, who encouraged him to become a poet. He continued to write poems and songs and began a commonplace book in 1783, while his father fought a legal dispute with his landlord. The case went to the Court of Session, and Burnes was upheld in January 1784, a fortnight before he died.

Rare books in the National Library of Scotland

Scotland's National Bard". scottishexecutive.gov.uk. Scottish Executive. 25 January 2008 . Retrieved 10 June 2009. [ permanent dead link] Robert Burns died from heart disease at the age of thirty-seven. On the day of his death, Jean Armour gave birth to his last son, Maxwell. Beethoven-Haus Bonn (1 April 2002). "Beethoven-Haus Bonn". Archived from the original on 23 December 2015 . Retrieved 23 December 2015. Significant 19th-century monuments to him stand in Alloway, Leith, and Dumfries. An early 20th-century replica of his birthplace cottage belonging to the Burns Club Atlanta stands in Atlanta, Georgia. These are part of a large list of Burns memorials and statues around the world. Burns the man became central because he was at one and the same time typical and atypical—a struggling tenant farmer become tax collector and poet. If he could transcend his birth-right, achieving recognition in his lifetime and posthumous fame thereafter, so might any Scot. Thus Burns became a symbol of every person’s potentiality and even of Scotland’s future as an independent country. To many, Burns became a hero; almost immediately after his death a process of traditionalizing his life began. People told one another about their personal experiences with him; repeated tellings formed a loose-knit legendary cycle which emphasizes his way with women, his impromptu poetic abilities, and his innate humanity. Many apocryphal accounts found their way into early works of criticism. But the legendary tradition has had a particularly dynamic life in a “calendar custom” called the Burns Supper.