Dismantling the Burns Myths

 

(Or attempting to!)  Our Scots bard has been portrayed at times as a reckless, womanising drunk, and his poetry work has not been taken seriously by academics and educators. I believe these false myths are far from the truth and are of serious consideration. Because our national bard continues to this day to have a significant impact on Scots national image and psyche. 

He has written some of Scots most loved poetry and songs and we celebrate Burns night each January 25^th.

 

He has been dismissed as an uneducated farmer. These myths matter, because as our Scots national bard Burns image is one of the most famous image for Scots. It matters on our images of “Scottishness” and of our long history of Scots cultural identity. 

  In fact Burns was voted by Scots as the most iconic Scots image, much like Mozart’s image in Vienna. During Victorian empire times Burns was viewed as part of the empire narrative associated to Walter Scott’s romantic Scottish nostalgia – of a Scotland that was lost and gone forever – and this image focused on Burns love poems, while neglecting his other work.

 

The elites, the academics and literati in Edinburgh found it hard to accept the farmer Burns in his boots who never attended university: but was self educated through his local education, his father and his own reading. He met the great and the good here and began his song collecting journeys, after meeting James Jamieson who published the Scot musical museum.    

  

Burns was far more than the peasant farmer or ploughman poet and was highly educated. What is often ignored is that Burns father was a cultured, disciplined and well spoken man himself, who greatly valued education for his family. His mother knew and sang all the old Scots ballads. For a few years Burns attended a school in Ayr where he was taught by the young teacher John Murdoch, at the age of seven, and he became a great reader. After which he and Gilbert were tutored by Murdoch over the occasional summer months.

 

 Yes he may have occasionally enjoyed social drinking, but as he writes from Ellisland to his friend Robert Cunningham in 1791, after a party when he had sold off the Ellisland farm equipment:  “After the roup was over, about thirty people engaged in a battle and fought it out for three hours. Not was the scene much better in the house. Not fighting, indeed, but folk lying drunk on the floor and decanting, until both my dogs got so drunk by attending them, that they could not stand. You will easily guess how I enjoyed the scene as I was no further over than you used to see me.”  

Tam O Shanter by Alexander Goudie

Anchors Close Edinburgh

Edina , the New World

Poozie Nansies

Burns & highland Mary

Library books Ellisland

There has been too much negativity written. Why? Was it because Burns didn’t fit into normal accepted norms, and had friends he met at the Globe Inn who were reformers for votes for all men? Because he grew up the son of a tenant farmer?  Because he was a free, independent thinker, who challenged the elites narratives. Or mainly because he wrote in the Scots language and therefore was not to be taken seriously. 

Considering all Burns writing, studying, researching and collecting – his many letters, poems, songs and epistles. His years of toil and hard farm labour growing up, plus his Scotia travels during his short life and all the myths that surround him. I find it hard to believe that Burns was a hard drinker as some myths put out. Because, how did he find time to write some of his best poetry at Ellisland and in Dumfries – plus his Excise work of detailed record keeping, long days travelling on horseback and being a young father. 

Burns poetry and song have become a symbolic touchstone of Scottish identity for generations, The Patriot Bard, by Patrick Scott Hogg

 

In the age of enlightenment Burns believed in the power of reason and common sense. When there was a crackdown on democratic reform. The Jacobite cause was symbolic of the country’s lost, romantic past. The tyrannical oppression of the Pitt government

brought the enlightenment movement to its knees, and silenced the leading minds of a generation. Burns risked his life and freedom to continue composing such radical material of social satire during his last few years. He published anonymously Scots Wa Hae as too he considered it too seditious.

Women and Image

Perhaps mums can boycott pink and fluffy!

Hollywood star Lauren Bacall died this week. She was a strong, assertive woman both on screen and off who knew her own mind and how to express herself without fear of backlash in a man's world. 

Back in the Hollywood glamour days there were other strong women - Vivien Leigh, Marlyn Monroe, Betty Gable and Olivia de Havilland.  They were central figures in their films. In the 80s we had more strong women with the actresses Sigourney Weaver, Nicole Kidman and others. These women appeared in control of their own image.

I am concerned with the dawn of the Internet age we have gone backwards again. We now have pop icons for the younger generation - such as Lady Gaga or Miley Cyrus  who are exploited to expose their bodies for men's enjoyment. This must have a poor effect on young girls and make them think to gain attention it is all about body image and exposing themselves, rather than character or any substance.   

While too there are still some strong women female leads today such as Angelina Jolie, who is both attractive but also a women of substance. 

Today I have to wonder what has happened to women of character - such as keen writer Jo in the novel Little Women or Jane's Austen's Elizabeth and speaking up to posh Mr Darcy??  These women had other interests apart from finding a man and they were portrayed through women's eyes. It concerns me that few men read women writers and don't they wish to understand how half of the population thinks and feels?  I happily admit to having read many great male writers, why not, I want to understand men too.   

In recent years women's magazines have appalled me mostly. Cosmopolitan is not what it once was - back in the 70s and 80s it was a new platform for women but I haven't bought Cosmo for the past decade as it has become bland and predictable. In the 80s I bought Vanity Fair both for its interesting articles and photography or Vogue, also for the photos.  In the past few month is have bought Bazaar for its photography and text too, which is often written by respected authors.  

I also buy magazines on music and photography, which are in the men's section on the magazine racks.

I used to teach 7 and 8 year olds. I noticed if I asked them to draw a picture that the boys would draw all kinds of things - war planes, Roman soldiers, ships, battles, aircraft, monsters, space, volcanoes, cars - wheras the girls usual drew mostly houses and flowers. It concerned me that girls seemed to have much fewer interests. I brought up two sons and a daughter when I noticed in the toyshops the boys toys were fun - building blocks, lego, airplanes, cars, transformers, spaceships, more, more....

!  By comparison the girls aisles were pink and fluffy - with rows of dolls (my daughter wondered what on earth you were supposed to do with the dolls?) I bought her lego, play dough and pencils to draw with.  I admit she loved her teddy -  then again my boys loved their dog and blanket respectively!   

Perhaps mums can boycott pink and fluffy in favour of buying their daughters toys that are proactive so that girls can learn to be more active with toys such a building blocks, play dough, lego, crayons or sports equipment. As opposed to superficial brushing hair or changing outfits.

I believe girls need just as many interests as the boys, so they can be outward looking like men rather than inward looking. . I lived in America for ten years when my children were young and girls there play much more sport. Sport teaches us how to be team players, which are crucial skills for many careers.  

It concerns me that nothing much has changed and the Toy shop aisles are still for girls pink and fluffy and the boys aisles are full of road racers and transformers....