Robert Burns: biography, songs, poems, photos

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

The well-known folklorist Robert Burns was a bright, memorable personality and the national poet of Scotland. The biography of this eminent cultural figure is rather difficult. But this circumstance did not affect his work in any way. Burns wrote his writings in English and Scottish. He is the author of numerous poems and poems.

I would like to note that it was Robert Burns who received the title of national poet of Scotland during his lifetime.

Biography. Childhood

The future famous writer was born in 1957 in a large family. Robert had six brothers and sisters. The future poet studied reading and writing with teacher John Murdoch. He was hired by local farmers to teach lessons to their children. It was Murdoch who noticed the boy's special abilities and advised him to pay more attention to literature. Already in 1783, the first writings of Burns appeared, written in the Ayshire dialect.

Youth

When the young poet turnedtwenty-two years old, he leaves his father's house and goes to the city of Irvine to learn the profession of a flax processor there. However, after the workshop in which Robert was supposed to be engaged in a craft burned down in a fire, he returns to his homeland. In 1784 his father died. The eldest sons take on all the chores associated with farming on the farm. However, things are not going well.

Soon the family decides to leave the farm and move to Mossgil. The initiators of such a serious and responsible act were the older brothers - Gilbert and Robert Burns. The biography of the poet is full of unexpected turns and contradictory situations. Having moved to a new city, the young man meets his future wife, Jane Arthur. However, her father, not approving the choice of his daughter, does not give consent to the marriage. Desperate, Robert decides to leave for another country. Just at this time, he received an offer to work as an accountant in Jamaica. However, the plans were not destined to come true.

First success

At the same time, the first volume of his writings was published, published in June 1786 in Kilmarnock. The book was a huge success. 20 pounds - this is the reward that Robert Burns received for his work. The biography of this poet is truly extremely unpredictable. In the same year, the young folklorist went to Edinburgh. It was there that he received the first, rather impressive amount for the copyright on his debut poetry collection. The poems of Robert Burns were praised by writers, and the writer himself was called a poetic hope. Scotland.

Creative life

After this unexpected and overwhelming success, the famous folklorist makes several rather long trips around his native country. He collects folk songs, composes poems and poems. Receiving absolutely no pay for his work, Burns simply considers it his happiness to be able to record and preserve ancient folklore. Over the years of wandering, the family farm has fallen into disrepair.

After the publication of the third volume of poems, Burns goes to Elliszhevd. There he rents a new farm. By this time, he nevertheless married his beloved Jane, and they had several children. From that moment on, the writer worked as a tax collector and received a small salary, about 50 pounds a year. In 1791, he was offered to publish another collection, which included about a hundred essays.

Recent years

Robert Burns, whose photo is presented on this page, did a pretty good job with his official duties. However, more and more often he is seen in a state of intoxication. Subsequently, he was expelled from the literary society for supporting revolutionary ideas. Since that time, Burns increasingly spends time in the company of revelers. The poet died in 1796 from a rheumatic attack. Burns' best poem, according to literary critics, is The Merry Beggars. It depicts the lives of socially outcast revelers.

Burns Poems in Russia

The first prose translation of the works of this famous Scottish poet appeared four years after his death, in 1800d. Robert Burns became popular in the USSR thanks to highly artistic translations of S.

Marshak. For the first time Samuil Yakovlevich turned to the work of the Scottish folklorist in 1924. From the mid-thirties, he began to engage in systematic translations of Burns's writings. The first collection of Russian-language poems and poems was published in 1947. In total, Samuil Yakovlevich translated about 215 works, which is ¼ of the entire heritage of the poet. Marshak's interpretations are far from the literal text, but they are distinguished by the simplicity and lightness of the language, as well as a special emotional mood close to Burns's writings. Articles devoted to the work of this talented folklorist appear in periodicals every now and then. The eminent Russian cultural figure V. Belinsky was engaged in a deep study of the works of Burns. It should be noted that in his youth, the translation of the quatrains of the Scottish poet was done by Mikhail Lermontov. On the centenary of the death of the poet in Russia, the publishing house of A. Suvorin published collections of poems and poems by Robert Burns.

Songs

It should be noted that many of the works of this popular poet were the processing of folk songs melodies.

His poems are characterized by melody and rhythm. Not surprisingly, the author of the texts of many well-known Russian musical compositions is Robert Burns. Songs based on his poems were once written by such famous Soviet composers as G. Sviridov and D. Shostakovich. In the repertoire of Alexander Gradskythere is a cycle of vocal works based on poems by Burns. His texts formed the basis of many compositions created by Mulyavin for the Pesnyary VIA. The Moldovan group "Zdob Si Zdub" also performed a song based on the text of Burns "You left me". The folk group "Melnitsa" wrote the music for his ballad "Lord Gregory" and the poem "Highlander". Very often, songs based on the verses of this famous foreign poet were used in television films. I would especially like to highlight the romance from the film “Hello, I am your aunt”, called “Love and Poverty”. This composition was performed by the talented actor Alexander Kalyagin. In the film "Office Romance" another song was sounded, the author of the text of which is R. Burns - "There is no peace in my soul."