born Jan. 25, 1759, Alloway, Ayrshire, Scot.
died July 21, 1796, Dumfries, Dumfriesshire
National poet of Scotland.
The son of a poor farmer, he early became familiar with orally transmitted folk song and tales. His father's farm failed, and a farm he started himself quickly went bankrupt. Handsome and high-spirited, he engaged in a series of love affairs, some of which produced children, and celebrated his lovers in his poems. His Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect (1786) brought acclaim but no financial security, and he eventually took a job as an exciseman. He later began collecting and editing hundreds of traditional airs for James Johnson's Scots Musical Museum (1787–1803) and George Thomson's Select Collection of Original Scotish Airs (1793–1818); he substantially wrote many of these songs, though he did not claim them or receive payment for them. Among his best-known songs are "Auld Lang Syne," "Green Grow the Rashes, O," "John Anderson My Jo," "A Red, Red Rose," and "Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonnie Doon." He freely proclaimed his radical opinions, his sympathies with the common people, and his rebellion against orthodox religion and morality.
Robert Burns, detail of an oil painting by Alexander Nasmyth; in the National Portrait Gallery, ...
Courtesy of The National Portrait Gallery, London