Jackson Bibliography of Romantic Poetry

BURNS, Robert (1758-96: ODNB)

Poet, farmer. Born at Alloway, Ayrshire, he was the eldest child of William Burnes [sic], a tenant farmer, and Agnes (Brown) Burnes. His father could read and write; his mother and a widowed cousin who lived with the family were illiterate but proved to be fertile sources for the ballads, stories, and songs which inspired him. Despite ongoing and often severe financial woes, William ensured that his son was educated, and by 1774 Burns was beginning to compose songs. In 1776 the family moved to Lochlie, near Tarbolton, where Burns worked as a ploughboy while continuing to widen his reading, write poetry, romance the local girls, and learn to play the fiddle. He moved to Irvine where a friend, Richard Brown, was the first to encourage him to think of publishing his poetry. In 1781 he became a freemason which widened his social contacts. Returning to Locklie shortly before his father’s death in 1784, Burns began more systematically developing his poetic talent, keeping a commonplace book and experimenting with various poetic forms, notably “Standard Habbie,”  a six-line stanza which came to be identified with his name. While Burns and his brother struggled to maintain a farm together, he also fathered at least one illegitimate child for which he and the woman were punished as fornicators by the church. Another woman, Jean Armour, became pregnant by him, but she was exiled to Paisley by her father and, in desperation, Burns applied to sail for Jamaica. However, when his first published volume of poems was issued by subscription and Jean Armour gave birth to twins, he resolved on staying in Scotland. Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect sold out within a month and introduced Burns to numerous influential supporters and admirers when he undertook a tour of Scotland in 1787. In 1788 he trained as an excise officer and, despite multiple other dalliances (some of which produced children), finally married Jean Armour. After farming for a time at Ellisland, they moved to Dumfries where Burns, working as an excise officer, was very involved with collecting songs for James Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum (1787-1803). His final years were marked by ill-health and episodic return of the depression which had plagued him throughout his life. He died at home of heart disease. Jean gave birth to the last of his children, the short-lived Maxwell, on the day of his funeral at St. Michael’s, Dumfries. Following his death, poems that had been only privately circulated during his life were published and two major collections, edited by James Currie (1800) and by R. H. Cromek (1808), were issued. (ODNB 25 May 2018)

• Burns

Books written (300):