Showing posts with label dumfries. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dumfries. Show all posts

Wednesday 30 September 2020

BURNS Photos


May liberty meet wi success

May prudence protest her frae evil

May tyrants and tyranny tine i the mist

And wander their way to the deil! 

For the past years I have been following in Robert Burns footsteps and reading of the national Scots bard. As I live north of Glasgow I’ve been able to make several journeys down to Burns country in Ayrshire to find the real Burns behind the many myths. Here are some of my favourite Burns photos.

Burns wanted to be a Bard for all of Scotland, not only Ayrshire – and so in 1787 he embarked on travels by horseback across the Borders, the west highlands and further north. He collected songs and poems, to help keep Scots heritage alive. Its not widely recognised but he gained great inspiration from many English poets, such as Alexander Pope and other writers and his letters are written in English. But it was when he read Robert Fergusson’s poetry in Scots, he realised the power of his native tongue. So he combined the force of Scots and the imagery of English. He also knew Latin and French and had been tutored by his father and a young teacher John Murdoch. He was also a great reader. 





 

Burns pens

Ellisland farm beside the river Nith

Burns desk Ellisland looking over the orchard 



Burns was a unique mix of his mother's ballads and his fathers education. He worded hard, wrote and read constantly. Robert Burns 1759 - 1796

1786 

Burns first book of poems published

1787

 Oct. Again in Edinburgh and wrote songs for the Scots Musical Museum. Dec met Nancy.

1788. Left Edinburgh and married Jean in April and moved to build a farmhouse Ellisland north of Dumfries. Jean joined December at the farm. Trained to be an exciseman collecting taxes. 

1790 Feb. Third Volume of Scots Musical Museum with 40 songs published.

At Hallowe’en composed Tam O’Shanter. 

 

1791 Moved to Dumfries in October 

July his brother William died at 13. 

1792

Fourth volume of poems published with 47 of my poems. Nancy left for Jamaica in January 1792. Elizabeth Riddell born November.

April given the Dumfries first foot and walk, which paid more.

Reform was happening. John Taylor was arrested and accused by Robert Dundas as a ringleader – ‘of a mob, raged in a riotous and tumultuous manner.’  And brought before Creech. A witness was Robert Graham of Fintry and Alexander Nasmyth was on the jury. Burns asked him to design scenery for the new theatre. 

Sent Creech poems autumn 1792 and signed myself Ca ira, a wild flourish! 

 

1793

Creech published Second Edinburgh Edition, 2 volume edition of Burns Poems. 

The French king was executed. Burns suffered extreme mood swings and conflicts – hypochondria he called it. 'I often despaired, suffered low moods. The more I was in the position of authority the more I rebelled!'

May moved to a red brick 2 storey town house, Mill fennel, 

1794

James Glencairn born August. 

1795

Joined the Dumfries volunteers. Sept Elizabeth died. Burns fell ill. 

1796

December fifth volume of  Scots Music Museum published with 3 Burns songs – 

Dancing was independence. Burns died july 1796


Mauchline


Dumfries house



First Book Poems Chiefly in the Scotch Dialect

Wednesday 31 October 2018

Robert Burns Ellisland


This summer I was so pleased to visit the last farm our great poet Robert Burns lived in. Ellisland is just north of Dumfries and incredibly is pretty intact as when Burns lived here and contains books and other material he had there.  
 **In 1788, Rob and Jean settled at Ellisland farm, a few miles north of the town of Dumfries. It was romantic and he was so pleased to have the river Nith running beside the new farm. A new farm house had to be built: the land was neglected with old ‘run-rigs’ strips, little drainage, no hedges to keep animals off the crops and no farm house. They had a servant and farm workers at Ellisland farm, so he was then able to write many songs and poems while he lived here - Auld Lang Syne (1988), Banks O Doon (1791) and his masterpiece the narrative poem Tam O'Shanter(1791). 

Robert Burns had enjoyed a second winter in Edina in 1788, when stayed in St Andrews square. 
He left Edina that March, little knowing I would never return there. He wanted to return to find his muse to the land and to raise his young family. 

Burns married his Jean in March 1788 and they lived for a time in a small room in Mauchline. 
He was offered the choice of three farms and decided on Ellisland. The farm houses and Byre had taken some time to build and Jean stayed with his mother to learn about cheese making for those months.



Burns found time to write near the woods of Craigie burn near Moffa and at the Hermitage.  He visited the Birks O Aberfeldy on his highland tour. He wrote and sang in the open air to study nature and human nature both. He studied the life of nature around him, from the wild flower, the river banks, the woodlands, the bird song, the small animals underneath, and the fields of corn.

His most famous song, Auld Lang Syne was written after he heard an old man singing this songs and Burns added new verses. Burns collected all these old songs on his Scotia travels, which inspired him to write his own songs too
He wrote Tam O Shanter – his most famous narrative poem on a free day as he walked along the shady path by the banks of the river Nith. He lived at Ellisland for four years. 

He also began training to be an Exciseman, which meant long rides away from home. 
Burns was only thirty and he had been the toast of Edina - he was the new father, the struggling farmer and the ambitious bard. 

Perhaps he had been doing too much - a young father, Exciseman, farmer and collecting songs and writing poetry.  
It became all too much. He sold off the stock to leave the farm life for town life in Dumfries.  
And in 1981 he and his young family left Ellisland for a town house in Dumfries town