Robert Burns was a Scottish poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide.
Aliases • Rabbie Burns, • Scotland's favourite son, • the Ploughman Poet, • Robden of Solway Firth, • the Bard of Ayrshire • The Bard in Scotland
• Robbie was born in a thatched cottage in Alloway, Ayrshire. • His father, William Burnes, was a moderately welleducated farmer who did some of the teaching of his children and occasionally provided private tutors. • Robbie did a lot of reading on his own, including works by philosophers John Locke and Adam Smith.
• He worked on the family farm until his father's death in 1784 and continued farming with his brother Gilbert, 1784 -86.
• As a young man Burns made a study of local religious phenomena and read with interest lots of liberal theological works.
• In 1780 Burns founded a masons debating society, the Tarbolton Bachelor's Club. Among the subjects discussed were "Whether do we derive more happiness from Love or Friendship? " and "Whether is the savage man or the peasant of a civilised country in the most happy situation? “ His Masonic connection had helped to pave his way in Edinburgh society when he was promoting himself as a poet.
1786 was the most significant year in Burns's life • He had been unsuccessful as a farmer. • His irregular marriage to Jean Armour was legally annulled by her father. Burns felt that Jean, in cooperating with her father, had deserted him. • In need of a new beginning, he considered going to the West Indies to work on a sugar plantation.
• • To raise the funds to pay for his passage, Burns published a collection of the poems he had composed over several years. This printing of Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, the "Kilmarnock edition, " made him a local celebrity.
• In the winter of 1787 Burns conducted a largely romance with the widow Nancy Mac. Le. Hose. • Mac. Le. Hose was torn between her affection for Burns and her Calvinist conscience. • He married a second time.
• In 1791 Burns moved to the town of Dumfries, where he worked as a taxcollector.
• Burns died of heart failure in early middle age, his heart having been damaged when he was young by rheumatic fever. Robert Burns Mausoleum and statue in Dumfries
• Throughout his life Burns believed passions were a gift of God for human pleasure.
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