Robert Fergusson: Selected Poems

Robert Fergusson

ISBN 10: 1846970350 / ISBN 13: 9781846970351

Published by Polygon, 2007

Seller Inventory # GOR010561277

Synopsis:

'O thou, my elder brother in misfortune,By far my elder brother in the Muse ...' - Robert Burns on Robert Fergusson.

Written in 1787 after Burns had paid for a memorial stone to be erected over Fergusson's grave in the Canongate Kirkyard.

Born in Edinburgh in 1750, Robert Fergusson has long been acknowledged as a crucial influence on Robert Burns, not least by Burns himself. But Fergusson was also a remarkable poet in his own right. For the few years in which he wrote, before dying in tragic circumstances at the age of 24, his work delighted readers with its vigour and craft. Although he wrote much verse in English - in the then fashionable Augustan style - it is his Scots verse with its great warmth, humanity, satire and outrageous comedy that is his enduring legacy. His work covers a wide range of human emotions and experience, and his subject matter ranges from drunken encounters with notorious City Guard to quieter reflections on pastoral themes. The poems are as fresh and appealing now as they were during the Age of Enlightenment in which they lived.

About the Author: James Robertson is one of Scotland's most significant writers, whose novels include Joseph Black (winner of the Saltire Scottish Book of the Year and the Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year 2003/2004), The Testament of Gideon Mack (longlisted for the Man Booker prize in 2006), And the Land Lay Still, and The Professor of Truth (2013). He is general editor of Black and White Publishing's Itchy Coo imprint, which produces books in Scots for young readers.

Bibliographic Details

Title: Robert Fergusson: Selected Poems
Publisher: Polygon
Publication Date: 2007
Binding: Paperback
Condition: Fine