This "magnificent and authoritative work" presents the complete verse of Scotland's National Bard with extensive textual and historical notes (Colm Toibin, The Independent, UK). Best known for poems such as "A Red, Red Rose" and "Ae Fond Kiss," and for the song "Auld Lang Synge," which is sung around the world every New Years' Eve, Robert Burns was one of the most important poets of the 18th century. A major influence on the Romantic poetry movement, Burns is still beloved across Scotland, with Burns Night celebrated every January 25th. This complete volume of the writer's poetry and songs includes previously unpublished pieces, draws on extensive scholarship and Burn's own letters, and offers supplemental information about his life, early hardships, political beliefs, and literary contexts. An extensive glossary of Scots words is included. "A very fine edition, and the long introduction, which sets out to clear the tangled banks, is alone worth the cover price."-The Scotsman, UK

Robert Burns (1759 - 1796) was a Scottish poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide. Along with Walter Scott, he is probably the best known Scottish writer in the world. His life story is often represented as one of sexual and alcoholic excess. Perhaps less well known is the political turmoil of the time, and the physical hardships which he endured, which at one point led him to contemplate emigrating to Jamaica. It was the success of his published poetry that helped change his mind, and he went on to be lionised by Edinburgh society and the literary establishment, as much a misunderstood and sentimentalised "heaven-taught ploughman" as the Ettrick Shepherd. Like James Hogg, Burns wrote scathing satirical poetry such as Holy Willie's Prayer in which he scorned religious bigots and hypocrits.