Robert Burns

Scotland’s national bard was a colourful figure whose poetry was imbued with roguish charm.

- Lawrence Alexander

Should auld acquaintance be forgot…Even people who claim they know nothing about poetry can recite Auld Lang Syne. We will never know how much of the Hogmanay classic ‘Rabbie’ Burns was responsible for; he never claimed the ballad as his own, but without him, it would almost certainly have been lost. Robert Burns not only wrote some of the world’s most famous poetry but spent much time collecting and preserving ancient Scottish traditions.

He was born on 25 January 1759, in Alloway, Ayrshire, in a tiny house shared with his tenant-farmer parents and six siblings, now the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum. When not enduring physical toil, young Robert read voraciously.