Robert Burns

Robert Burns was born in 1759, the son of a tenant farmer in Ayrshire, and worked the land from childhood. At twenty-seven he published a volume of poems in Scots dialect to pay his passage to Jamaica; its success kept him in the country. He then devoted years to collecting and rewriting hundreds of Scottish songs for music collections, without ever earning money from them. Employed in the excise to make a living, he died at thirty-seven. His birthday, 25 January, is celebrated every year with dinners in his honour, in Scotland and around the world.

In the catalogue 1

• PoetryThe Jolly BeggarsRobert Burns · 1799LiteraturePublic domain