Robert Burns (redirected from Rabbie Burns)

Burns, Robert 

Born Jan. 25, 1759, in the village of Alloway, near the town of Ayr, Scotland; died July 21, 1796, in Dumfries. Scottish poet.

Burns was born into a poor peasant family. All his life he struggled with extreme poverty. He began to write poetry at the age of 15. Burns combined his poetic work with work on the farm, and later with his duties as an excise official (from 1789). The satirical poems “The Twa Herds” (1784) and “Holy Willie’s Prayer” (1785) were widely circulated in manuscript and strengthened Burns’ reputation as a freethinker. His first book, Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect (1786; 2nd ed., 1787; 3rd ed., in 2 vols., 1793), immediately brought widespread fame to the poet. Burns prepared Scottish songs for the Edinburgh publication The Scots Musical Museum (published by J. Johnson) and the Select Collection of Original Scottish Airs (published by G. Thomson).

Burns welcomed the Great French Revolution (the poem “The Tree of Liberty” and others) as well as the upsurge in the revolutionary democratic movement in Scotland and England. On the basis of folklore and old Scottish literature (A. Ramsay and R. Fergusson), Burns, who had assimilated the progressive ideas of the Enlightenment, created an original form of poetry that was modern in spirit and content. Burns’ work (“Is There for Honest Poverty” and others) asserted the personal worth of man, which the poet placed above titles and wealth. His poems in praise of labor, creativity, merriment, liberty, and unselfish, self-sacrificing love and friendship coexist with satire; humor, tenderness, and heartiness are intermixed with irony and sarcasm in his poetry. Burns’ poems are characterized by simplicity of expression, an emotional quality, and an inner dramatic quality that is often shown in the composition of the poem (The Jolly Beggars and others).

Many songs by Burns have been set to music and are still performed. Burns’ poems have been translated into many of the world’s languages. In Russia during the 19th century they were translated by 1.1. Kozlov and M. L. Mikhailov; in the USSR, by E. G. Bagritskii, T. L. Shchepkina-Kupernik, and others. The translations by S. Ia. Marshak are especially popular.

WORKS

Poems and Songs. Edited by J. Barke. London-Glasgow, 1955.
The Letters, vols. 1–2. Edited by J. de Lancey Ferguson. Oxford, 1931.
In Russian translation:
Robert Berns ν perevodakh S. Marshaka: Izbrannoe, books 1–2. Moscow, 1963.

REFERENCES

Istoriia angliiskoi literatury, vol. 1, issue 2. Moscow-Leningrad, 1945.
Orlov, S. A. “Berns ν russkikh perevodakh.” Uch. zap. Leningradskogo pedagogicheskogo in-ta im. A. I. Gertsena, 1939, vol. 26.
Elistratova, A. R. Berns. Moscow, 1957.
Rait-Kovaleva, R. Robert Berns, 3rd ed. Moscow, 1965.
Venok Robertu Bernsu [Sb. st.]. Moscow, 1964.
Daiches, D. Robert Burns. London, 1966.
Lindsay, M. The Burns Encyclopaedia. London, 1959.
Catalogue of Robert Burns: Collection in the Mitchell Library, Glasgow. Glasgow, 1959.
Cuthbertson, J. Complete Glossary to the Poetry and Prose of Robert Burns. New York-London, [1967].
Egerer, J. W. A Bibliography of R. Burns. Carbondale (III.), [1965].

A. A. ELISTRATOVA