Book Review – The Merry Muses of Caledonia
Bawdy Scottish Folk Songs Written and Collected by Robert Burns
Oct 11, 2009
Scotland's national bard Robert Burns is known to have kept a special notebook for the bawdy Scottish folk songs which he collected, amended and wrote. In 1799, three years after his untimely death at the age of 37, they first appeared in book form.
This new edition from Luath Press is based largely on an edition of 1959 with a new introduction by Valentina Bold, drawings by Bob Dewar and the music for some of the songs.
Not for Maids, Ministers or Striplings
So said the poet and songwriter himself. The Merry Muses are cheerfully coarse songs which tell mainly of sexual encounters between men and women and frequently use obscene words, language and imagery.
However, as Valentina Bold puts it in her introduction to this new volume when writing of the various editions of The Merry Muses which have been published over the 200 years since Robert Burns died : "The contents, too, are supposed to represent Burns Burns as we hope he was: openly sexual, raucously humorous, playful yet empathetic to women."
Are The Merry Muses of Caledonia Pornographic?
They have been considered as such for much of their history. Earlier editions left out the name of any publisher or printer for fear of being prosecuted for publishing obscene literature.
Robert Burns originally shared these songs with drinking buddies and other male friends such as the members of the Crochallan Fencibles and the Bachelors' Club at Tarbolton. These men would have had the typically robust attitudes of the 18th century male - and occasional female - to discussion of sexual exploits and bawdy language.
Read in the 21st century, The Merry Muses are still pretty rude and undoubtedly shocking to some. In other modern readers they may raise a smile rather than a frown.
How the Songs in This Edition of The Merry Muses are Presented
At times, the introductory essays in this edition of The Merry Muses use and quote obscene words to illustrate various points. Following the style of the 1959 edition, the songs themselves censor the same words, using first and last letters with a line in between.
This can come across as a little quaint and even a little frustrating, particularly for those words which were rude in the 18th century but have now fallen out of use!
Bawdy Scottish Folk Songs or Love Poetry?
Sometimes Burns cleaned up a traditional song and turned it into one which was indeed suitable for the ears of maids, minister and striplings. John Anderson, My Jo is one example. The traditional version has a wife demanding in pretty frank terms that her husband give her sexual satisfaction. Robert Burns' polite version is a beautiful evocation of the enduring love between a long-married couple.
Similarily, in Coming Through The Rye, the body coming through the rye goes rather farther than simply kissing the other body who is doing likewise.
Sexually Explicit But Burns' Innate Humanity Shines Through
Robert Burns not only loved women, he liked them too. He also clearly believed that men who'd had illicit affairs with women had a subsequent responsibility to them and any child which resulted from the liaison.
Wha'll Mow Me Now? - sung to the tune of Coming Thro' The Rye - is an original composition of the poet's sung from the point of view of a woman loved and left by her soldier lover. Burns ends the song with a verse damning "the lousy loon," who abandons a girl he slept with and "denies the bairn he got!"
Robert Burns's Bawdy Songs are Sung Today
As Valentina Bold points out, The Merry Muses of Caledonia were designed to be sung and many Scottish singers have and continue to do so. These artists include Gill Bowman, Tich Frier, Jean Redpath and Rod Paterson. Many of The Merry Muses are performed within the groundbreaking 12 CD Linn Record collection The Complete Songs of Robert Burns.
Place of The Merry Muses of Caledonia in Robert Burns' Work
Robert Burns wrote beautifully of love in all its manifestations: love for friends and family, romantic love and sexual love. The honest and straightforward rude enjoyment of graphic depictions of sex in The Merry Muses are an integral part of his life and work.
Although these sexually explicit songs still have the power to shock, the man behind them emerges as he does from all of his work: full of love, laughter, passion, compassion, humanity and a huge capacity for friendship and empathy with men, women, children and the natural world.
The Merry Muses of Caledonia is published by Luath Press.
Read more on the official Robert Burns website.
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