Robert Burns, A Very Peculiar History

Touching Scotland's soul

With MacDiarmid’s words of warning ringing in our ears, where do we begin? For almost 250 years, Burns has been a – no, the – Scottish cultural hero. A poet! A ploughman! A wild, natural genius! A studious book-lover! A loyal son, a loving father! A seducer, a libertine!

A carefree drunkard – or depressed and dyspeptic? (The latter. Burns frequently suffered from ‘melancholia’ – and terrible indigestion. As a remedy for the stomach trouble he ate home-made sheep’s-milk cheese.) A celebrity, but with muddy boots and farmyard language that ‘excites contempt by its meanness and uninteresting simplicity’ (Robert Heron, A Memoir of the Life of the Late Robert Burns, 1797). A friend of nobles and the gentry. A fierce critic of pomp and privilege. A dutiful, tax-collecting, civil servant. A bold free spirit, champion of equality!

The man is a mass of contradictions. Indeed, we are so fascinated and perplexed by his short, intense, eventful life, that we often forget to read his poetry. In a 2004 Scottish survey, only 38% of men and 35% of women could recall a single verse from the works of ‘The Bard’.

More recently, Burns has also been hailed as a friend of Scotland’s Union with England – and as a supporter of Scots Independence. His name and image have been used – and abused – in every possible way, to promote ‘Brand Scotland’ all round the world. Countless things have been named after him, from an international humanitarian award to a diesel locomotive and (if campaigners have their way) an airport currently threatened with closure.