The story of James Hogg is one of the most remarkable and unlikely ascents in the history of British literature. Born into the humblest of circumstances in the wilds of the Scottish Borders, he rose from a life of manual labour to stand, albeit often awkwardly, alongside the literary giants of his age. He was a man of profound contradictions: a self-taught genius who could be as coarse as he was inspired, a humble sh…
“My mother is actually a living miscellany of old songs. I never believed that she had half so many until I came to a trial: there are none in your collection of which she hath not a part.”
Neighbourhood:
Georgian Poets, Nature Poets, Romantic Poets, Scottish Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Fear, Joy
Robert Burns was born on 25 January 1759 in the parish of Alloway, near Ayr, in southwestern Scotland, and died in Dumfries on 21 July 1796. In the relatively brief span of thirty-seven years, he became Scotland’s best-loved poet, a major maker and remaker of song, an incisive satirist, and an emblem of democratic fellow feeling. His reputation has sometimes obscured the complicated human being beneath it. Burns was…
“A poet is a creature of impulse, and must follow the bent of his own genius.”
Neighbourhood:
Folk & Ballad Poets, Poet-Musicians, Political Poets, Scottish Poets
Emotional landscape: Tenderness, Longing, Joy
