Talk:Robert Burns

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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Robert Burns article.
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This article incorporates public domain text from: Cousin, John William (1910). A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. London, J.M. Dent & sons; New York, E.P. Dutton.

Contents

[edit] Robbie Burns

No mention as Robbie Burns. [2004.12.31 JPiper]

Yes, that's true. No mention as "rantin' rovin' Robin", "Rab the Rhymer" or "Rabbie Burns" either. There are lots of things that you could call him. If you thought that a mention as "Robbie Burns" was needed why didn't you add one ? -- Derek Ross | Talk 19:08, 2004 Dec 31 (UTC)

[edit] Poems!!

Please don't copy/paste your favorite poem to the article, I removed the following text:

One of his most famous poems is:
          A Red, Red Rose
O my Luve's like a red, red rose, 
That's newly sprung in June: 
O my Luve's like the melodie, 
That's sweetly play'd in tune. 

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, 
So deep in luve am I; 
And I will luve thee still, my dear, 
Till a' the seas gang dry. 

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear, 
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun; 
And I will luve thee still, my dear, 
While the sands o’ life shall run. 

And fare-thee-weel, my only Luve! 
And fare-thee-weel, a while! 
And I will come again, my Luve, 
Tho' 'twere ten thousand mile!
                                              Robert Burns

You should add this to wikisource and not the article about Burns, thank you!

Actually this poem is already on wikisource[1]--130.161.31.26 19:17, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)
When I checked, there was no text in the article - so I copied the above in. Camillustalk 16:01, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. No poems but by all means expand the story of Rabbie's life. I've just put in the bare bones so far and there's room for lots more detail. -- Derek Ross | Talk 19:35, Feb 28, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Statues

An interesting bit of trivia that serves to highlight Burns popularity: There are more statues of Burns worldwide than of any other writer or composer. In fact the only people to have more statues erected to them are religious figures such as Christ and Buddha -- or Stalin (who liked erecting statues of himself). I would put this in the article if I could just find a reliable source to confirm it ... -- Derek Ross | Talk 2 July 2005 18:23 (UTC)

And given that that is the case, let's not turn this article into a list of statues of Burns. No more statues please. We've already got too many. -- Derek Ross | Talk 15:33, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
I just tried to organise what was there into subdivided country lists, but it does seem to be getting too bloated? Is there a case for a List of Robert Burns memorials? ::Supergolden:: 13:14, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
I think it is. I will move them. --Guinnog 17:08, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Currency convention

Gilbert Burns was his brother and was born in 1760. As per the Wikipedia:Manual of Style currency convention, I've changed the reference to '$36,000' to 'US$36,000'. If I am in error (if the purchase was made in AUS or CDN), please correct my edit. Although Euros might seem logical since Burns is Scottish, I guess the currency referred to in the article should be whatever the buyer paid in. Forgive me for being too lazy to look through the source material to find the answer myself.--Anchoress 09:46, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Euros are European. Since Burns is Scottish, pounds would seem to be more logical than euros. -- Derek Ross | Talk 16:09, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
Scotland is in Europe, though not yet in the Euro zone. Dollars are fine in the article.Guinnog 16:13, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
Scotland is in Britain. Europe is across the North Sea. Dollars are fine in the article. -- Derek Ross | Talk 18:46, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Scotland is in Britain. Europe is across the North Sea. And America is across the Atlantic. So why are dollars fine in the article? As it's about a British writer why would we impose an American currency? Yallery Brown 10:53, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
Scotland isn't 'in' Britain, it is part of it - it is also part of Europe. Dollars, however, make no sense - it should either be pounds or euro's. WP:MOSNUM suggests that pounds would be the most sensible outcome. SFC9394 11:02, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

You are all missing the point completely. As it stands there is an unreferenced statement "Copies of this edition are now extremely rare, and as much as US$36,000 has been paid for one" in the article. Either this should have a reference added, or it should be removed. If there was a reference then it is simple to determine the actual currency used in the transaction and then use that. /wangi 11:11, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sweet Afton

Anyone fancy writing a short stub for this poem, to overwrite some non-notable cruft that's currently there? Thanks/wangi 08:55, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Burns redirecting here

Is there any good reason why Burns redirects here? I know Robert Burns is famous, but there are lots of other cases in Wikipedia where a disambiguation page exists as the primary page for a surname, even if one of the listed people is extremely famous. I find it hard to believe that interested people will have a hard time finding the entry on Robert Burns if Burns doesn't redirect here. Dsreyn 15:33, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

This seems to be an instance of bias more than anything, and Burns doesn't need to redirect here. Burns has been moved to a disambiguation page four times with only the explanation "restore" by user:Mais oui!, an action which has been reverted three different times (about to be four times) by three different users, including myself. There are too many instances of Burns throughout Wikipedia, including city names (Burns, Colorado, i.e.) and people (R. Nicholas Burns, i.e.), for it to simply redirect here. Of a Google search, only two of the first ten results even have to do with Robert Burns. Please consider discussing this instead of simply reverting the same decision made by three different users with nothing but "restore" as an explanation. It doesn't help. --tomf688 (talk - email) 00:56, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Not sure where you get the google info from, typing burns into google gives 5 of the top 10 related to him - with the other 5 all being on different subjects (ie. no one clear competitor). If there was a clear second choice for the word then I would support going to a disambig - but I afraid Burns, Colorado doesn't really compete against an internationally recognised and celebrated poet (from the Burns, CO article: "It consists of a post office, as well as cluster of houses and trailers"). As for people - nobody is known just as "Burns", they are known as "foobar Burns" - the closest internationally known would probably be Mr. Burns from the Simpson’s, but even then he is always known as Mr Burns - not as just Burns, which is what RB is commonly known as. I don't think there is a clear case of anyone or anything else having anywhere near the notability of the singular word Burns, thus there is no reason that a diambig should be used. The disambig page should also be heavily altered to conform to the MOS, which states "Always place the most-common meaning(s) at the top." - at the moment we have a red linked Australian politician as the first entry, and Robert Burns half way down the page - that is just making life difficult for the end reader. SFC9394 01:22, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
The reason the Australian politician is first is that the entries are divided into subcategories, and arranged alphabetically within each group. There are plenty of other disambig pages that have a similar arrangement, including the division into subcategories. If all the names are arranged in one big list, and sorted by significance, it's not likely that it will help to find anyone other than the first few entries...and I would assume that most users can find Robert Burns already without much assistance. Dsreyn 03:11, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
I am simply following the diambig MOS - and unless there are special reasons to ignore it I would generally support following the MOS. I am sure out of the diambig list there are half a dozen or so that could be shaken to the top of the pile on the basis of notability, and the rest that are all much of a similar obscure level of notability could then be listed alphabetically. As it stands it makes non sense - either from an easy navigation point of view, or from a conforming to MOS point of view. SFC9394 11:37, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
Discussion of the layout for the disambig page doesn't really belong here. The main question we ought to be discussing is whether or not "Burns" should redirect here. Dsreyn 14:10, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Robert Burns may indeed be well known as simply "Burns", but there are just far too many other occurances of the word "Burns" for this guy to take precendence. He may be well known, but "Burns" is a very common name used in far more instances, unlike Plato. And SFC, are you using http://www.google.com or http://www.google.co.uk? I was referring to the .com version. --tomf688 (talk - email) 01:50, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Robert Burns' Catholic roots

A strong opponent to the Kirk of Scotland, a freemason and all...but here I found out something about Burns as a Catholic raised man. This is the link: http://www.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/frameindex.html?http://www.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/writings/people/robert_burns.html

I'm going to add his name to the "Scottish Roman Catholics" page. Gianmaria Framarin 2:39 3 June 2006

And while you're at it you might as well add every other Presbyterian, since they're all catholic in the sense used on that website. Oh wait a minute, "catholic" doesn't mean the same thing as "Roman Catholic", does it. Perhaps you'd better not. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:39, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] External links

I boldly (I think) cut out a lot of external links, leaving just:

  • www.robertburns.org/ (about as 'official' as it gets)
  • www.worldburnsclub.com (which has links to the other million Burns Clbs)
  • The Bard: The Story of Robert Burns, Official Feature Film Website
  • Gutenberg link

Most of the others were links to repositories of poems, but given that Gutenberg contains the Complete works and letters, the others seemed redundant. Apologies if anyone thinks I went too far, but i feel external links should be kept to a minimum. ::Supergolden:: 13:39, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Drunk Poets Society

If anybody cares, there's a celebration of Rabi every Jan, with a single-malt & an ode to a haggis (for which you'd need the single malt). Spenser for Hire 12:10, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Apologies for nitpicking, but I think you mean Rabbie. Rabi is a vegetable.--Guinevere50 17:37, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Standard Habbie

Why is there no mention of this stanza style in the article? --Mal 05:08, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Picture of Burns Statue, Dumfries

The text of the picture states that the Church behind it is Greyfriars, which is correct, but this is NOT the Greyfriars where Bruce slew Comyn. The site of that Church was a supermarket across the square from the current Greyfriars Church when I lived in Dumfries, and a plaque on the wall indicated this history. MikeG-Scot 16:43, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mirror without credit

An anon added this link: * Works By Robert Burns. Apart from a couple of links to downloadable books at the top, it's a mirror of this page, including edit links which appear to take you to edit here. There's no sign I could find of acknowlegement of Wikipedia, instead the banner at the foot says "Copyright © 2005 Bookyards.com - All rights reserved." This seems to me to be a clear copyright violation , but since I don't know what to do about it, I've moved it here. .. dave souza, talk 07:12, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Burns's not Burns'

Although some feel this is a contentious point, Burns takes the 's in the possessive. The Wiki definition is clear on this. The other reference is the official Robert Burns site, as linked to here, show the same Burns's in use.

http://www.google.com/search?as_sitesearch=www.robertburns.org&as_q=burns%27s[2]

MrMarmite 20:26, 22 May 2007 (UTC)


Perhaps Mr Mais_Oui you could have responded here rather than multiple reverts. MrMarmite 07:49, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I see you've been changing many Wikipedia articles - which is the Wikipedia article on apostrophe usage? Either is grammatically correct, but I don't know if Wikipedia policy is to prefer one form? Mdwh 10:31, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
The Link - [3] Thanks for your comment, I felt lonely here. The only ones I have changed are where the person themselves uses the 's. It is a point of much debate, and both the BBC and Burns's "official" website use both rather randomly. I've no plans on making any changes to Burns as I had hoped to start a discussion on the matter. MrMarmite 13:12, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the link, that's interesting to read. Mdwh 22:06, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

On balance I prefer Burns's. But whichever is to be preferred, this article ought to be consistent, which it currently isn't.

  • From the Biography section: "Burns's youth was passed in poverty ..."
  • From the Final years and poetic reputation section: "Burns' health began to give way ..."

--Malleus Fatuarum 21:48, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Easily fixed :) Consistent now. Chris Cunningham 06:52, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Deletions of Biography Contribution and additional Links

frglee 12/8/07

I note that two set of contributions I made a few days ago have been deleted. I am surprised that an obviously inadequate bigraphy section about Burns seems once more to stop in 1788 and contains no information about Ellisland farm or his work as a tax collector in Dumfries. I am also surprised that someone has seen fit to delete very useful links to Ellisland Farm museum,the Burns house and museum in Dumfries,The Burns centre In Dumfries and the Burns National heritage centre at Alloway. All were deleted.Why?

  • Please go back and read the entire article. Not only does it not stop in 1788, but everything you had added was aready there. You had inserted a mention of Ellisland, the excise in Dumfries, and Burns's death, just before the part on Burns's writing, when a piece on Ellisland and a linked reference to Burns's excise work, as well as a passage about his death already existed further on in the article. Also, the links that you added were to pages that didn't exist. If you were planning to write articles on Ellisland Farm, Jean Armour etc, please do so and feel free to link them in the article. I hope this clarifies the situation, Yallery Brown 23:05, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

I apologise for the error of the biography addition although I am still unable to find much information to Burns living in Dumfries in the remaining article.As I mentioned I think the biography seems rather limited, a bit disorganised and a little unbalanced..The long section re the masonic connections for example.

It is not true that the links I added do not exist. http://www.ellislandfarm.co.uk and http://www.dumgal.gov.uk/dumgal/MiniWeb.aspx?id=180&menuid=2811&openid=2802 and http://www.burnsheritagepark.com/attraction.php?id=1 are all useful and interesting links for visitors and those interested in the Robert Burns story,I think.They are a long way from being theme parks or commercial ventures btw,but are government supported centres much used by educational institutions.

Highlighting names and places on Wikipedia is surely just a way to draw attention to readers and editors that one reader thought that the items might be worthy of an article.If I do it it does not mean that I feel qualified to write an article myself,but I certainly agree that Jean Armour might make an interesting Wiki topic,especially as she has recently had a statue erected to her in Dumfries,Scotland. User:frglee 1600, 13 August 2007

  • The links to tourist attractions were deleted by another user who clarified why he'd done so in the edit summary. The highlighting of names in articles should only be done if they actually refer to other existing pages on Wikipedia, otherwise users are directed to a page which says 'This page does not exist'. While I don't disagree that Jean Armour and Ellisland are worthy of articles, until someone writes them there's really no point creating links for them. Dumfries is mentioned six times throughout the article. I agree that the biography could be expanded, but for the sake of quality this ought only to be done with information that isn't already in it.

Yallery Brown 17:41, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Blue Bells of Scotland

While it's not by Burns, this song was also popularised by the George Thomson "Select Collection". It seems like a fair bet that a Burns expert would have good references for this - ie that the song is in there, arranged by Haydn, which volume, etc? If you've got info like that handy, could you add it to Talk:Bluebells_of_Scotland or the article itself? - thanks Bazzargh 23:18, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Unco"

Unco redirects here. Anyone knows why? No "unco" string in the article.
--Jerome Potts 19:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Presumably because of Address To The Unco Guid. The editor responsible only has six edits, all on the same day over a year ago. If you feel like housekeeping you could take it to WP:RFD I suppose. Chris Cunningham 19:54, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merger proposal

I propose that Agnes Broun, his mother, should be merged here. See discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Agnes Broun. --Brewcrewer (talk) 01:33, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

  • I am against merging. The Agnes Broun article should stand or fall on its own merits but there seems little to merge to this article. --John (talk) 20:34, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Missing Question

Why is it that there is no mention of "Flow gently sweet Afton" whatsoever on this page when it is one of Burns's most popular works? No link or nothing? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.69.139.159 (talk) 03:02, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Well I suppose that it must be because neither you nor I have added any mention. I know why I didn't and, no doubt, you know why you didn't, so those are the reasons. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:04, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rantin Rovin Robin book link

Hi there,

I would like to include an external link to a website which features a book by the author Colin Hunter McQueen. I have read the criteria for including a link and feel that it may offer relevant information on the subject of Burns. I am a Burns fan and came across this website through a flyer distributed at a Burns Conference. The link is: http://www.drumbow.co.uk/RantinRovinRobin.htm thank you for your time. Pictmatrix (talk) 20:27, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV?

This article is marked NPOV but I see no controversy here on the talk page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.112.5.162 (talk) 17:06, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Read the opening paragraph where Robbie is referred to as one of the pioneers of the Romantic movement as one of the inspirations for the founders of Socialism and Liberalism (I guess he was big during the 1790's in France, too?). There is so much claimed about him and almost none of it is backed up (of all his nicknames, I've personally heard "Robbie" and "Bobby"...). The original author asserts that in Scotland he is known simply as "The Bard" - claiming that someone has a title that simple devoted to oneself in all of a country but having no sources is kind of silly. There are no direct citations throughout the whole article, too. 142.58.59.195 (talk) 00:00, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
It seems strange that you would challenge the POV of this based on what you personally have not heard, unless you would have a reasonable expectation of hearing it, through say having read a book about Burns, or being Scottish, perhaps. The nicknames are correct - I'll try to provide some cites for you. As to being "big during the 1790's in France", well, i'm pretty sure he was, actually, but that may take more digging than my interest supports. 86.44.6.14 (talk) 22:30, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
I have changed the tag to unrefrenced. Your comments are (correct) criticisms of the lack of referencing. NPOV is something different. SFC9394 (talk) 22:41, 11 February 2008 (UTC)