Should auld acquaintance be forgot...

... And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and Auld Lang Syne?

More catch up here. And this post been sitting in draft form for weeks now. Hope you don't mind me posting it up now...

January 25th is of course Burns Night. Celebrating the birth of Robert Burns, Scotland's most famous poet, on 25th January 1759.
I was in Glasgow just a few days after Burns Night and went to visit Burns statue in George Square.

And it was nice to see the row of floral tributes that had been placed at the statue by various Burns societies. I hadn't been aware up till now that people did mark the occassion in this way.

"My love is like a red, red rose..." As one of Burns' famous songs began. And these beautiful red roses show how much love there still is for this amazing man.


I won't go into the story of Burns' life here. If you want to read more then here is as good place to start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Burns

However, when looking at the dates on the plaque at the front of the statue I had forgotten how young he was when he died. Only 37.

On the other 3 sides of the statue are bas-relief scenes of 3 of Burns' most famous poems. At the top is "The Cottars Saturday Night", next is "The Vision"and finally "Tam O'Shanter".

The Tam O'Shanter is of course the most famous and is my favourite of the images. There is Tam and his faithful horse Meg. There are the witches and Nannie dancing with her short shirt (or Cutty Sark, after which the famous ship is named). And in the background is Old Nick, the devil himself playing on the bagpipes. Never knew there was a picture of the devil in George Square did you?

The statue was scuplted by George Edwin Ewing and there on the base is his mark. And there on the side the date 1874. Although the statue was not unveiled until 1877 in front of a crowd of 30,000 people.

The bas-relief images were produced by his younger brother James Alexander Ewing.

Now walking slightly further along the square is a statue of another poet. Thomas Campbell. Before I started writing this post I hadn't heard of Thomas Campbell and have wandered past this statue many times. But there is a connection between the 2 statues...

When the statue of Burns was suggested for George Square there was a bit of outrage as Burns didn't really have much connection with Glasgow while the Glasgow poet Thomas Campbell had no statue.
But in the end statues were raised for both poets in 1877.

Now this got me reading more about Thomas Campbell.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Campbell_(poet)

If you read this then you will find a fascinating life story all of his own. But one thing in particular caught my eye. In 1832 he helped set up and was president of the Literary Association of the Friends of Poland. This was in response to the failure of the November uprising in 1831 of the Poles against the Russians. If you have read early posts here then you will remember me talking about this before as there is a grave in the Necropolis to a soldier, Lieutenant Joseph F. Gomoszynski, who was involved in that very uprising.

http://glasgowtheday.blogspot.com/2009/06/hokey-religions-and-ancient-weapons-are.html

Did Thomas Campbell ever meet Joseph F. Gomoszynski? Seems strange if they didn't. An exile from the uprising in the city of birth of the founder of a society that championed his cause? It has made me even more curious to find out about this mysterious Polish lieutenant.

And there is that Glasgow/Poland connection again. Need to do some more posts here about this special connection that seems to go back so many, many years.

But will finish with a closer shot of the wonderful Burns statue. Happy Birthday Rabbie!! Looking good for 251 years old!!

Be well, be happy!!