Hail to the chief!

[FierceKitty]

I think Matthew Arnold expressed a similar opinion, didn't he?

[Hertsblue]

Talking of poets, today is the anniversary of the birth of Scotland's national bard, Robert Burns (born in the same year as Minden).

From the first verse of Address to the Haggis:-

Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o' the puddin-race!
Aboon them a' ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy of a grace
As lang's my arm.

Google doesn't translate that at all.....

[Ithoriel]

Am I only the one that thinks Burns was a bit crap, and he only gets attention because he wrote in dialect?

Yes

[Ithoriel]

Google doesn't translate that at all.....

Nice seeing your honest, chubby face,
Great chieftain of the sausage race!
Above them all you take your place,
Belly, tripe, or links:
Well are you worthy of a grace
As long as my arm.

[fsn]

I think we just get to hear the acceptable verses. I prefer his more earthly stuff - like "Come Rede me dame".

'Come rede me dame, come tell me dame,
My dame come tell me truly,
What length o' graith when weel ca'd hame
Will sair a woman duly?"
The carlin clew her wanton tail,
Her wanton tail sae ready,
"l learn'd a sang in Annandale,
Nine inch will please a lady." '

It's a delightful tale of a carpenter, asking about the dimensions of a shelf that his female client has asked to have installed in her wardrobe, but she is more interested in a Chinese take away. It roughly translates as:

'Come tell me dame, come tell me dame,
My dame come tell me truly,
What depth of shelf when well fitted
Will accommodate a woman's hats?"
The lady said her wonton take-away
Her wonton take-away was ready,
"l learned from Kirstie Alsopp,
Nine inches is a suitable depth for a shelf." '

[Westmarcher]

Aye, Nobby, he was quite a man wi' the lassies.

Am I only the one that thinks Burns was a bit crap, and he only gets attention because he wrote in dialect?

A bit like Shakespeare I suppose (in terms of dialect to our modern ears). I admit to having trouble with both, usually succeeding in getting the gist of the story and sometimes completely lost (particularly Shakespeare) and then getting back on track again  . In my younger years, I annually attended many a Burns Supper, an affair where the levels of inebriation start at "mildly drunk" then "very drunk" and finally "Boris Yeltsin."  [Curiously, at the first stage, Burns poetry starts to become clearer but alas, that is usually short lived and thereafter one's senses are more like Tom Hanks storming the beach at Omaha.]

It sometimes amazes me how popular Burns is worldwide. I already knew that his work is held in high esteem in Russia (a workmate used to go to Burns Suppers in Moscow). A business colleague used to organise Burns Suppers in Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur. But, on a visit to the Tredegar Arsenal in Richmond, I was very surprised when the American lady at the desk (on recognising my Scottish accent) started spouting poetry from Burns - she was a member of the local Burns Club  . Burns also wrote in standard English (pre "BBC English" - another dying dialect) and apparently had a great influence on the works of Wordsworth, Coleridge and Shelley. 

Sometimes McGonagall's work is confused with Burns - many say he was crap (e.g., "As I was walking down the road, I met a coo. A bull b'goad!") - I suppose its all a matter of taste.

....... oh, hello again, Chieftain, welcome back to your Intro thread and the Pendraken Forum ( aka "Tangents'R'Us").   

[Hertsblue]

It's also remarkable how many of his poems have been transformed into quite melodic songs. Usually verse set to music has all the appeal of the shipping forecast in morse.