The Canongate Burns by Robert Burns

Author:Robert Burns [Andrew Noble / Patrick Scott Hogg]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847674456
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2009-12-03T16:00:00+00:00

This is marked by the trauma of failure of revolutionary anticipations, reiterated cries of despair found in the late Burns comparable in quality and intensity to those prevailing in William Hazlitt’s prose. In 1792 all still seemed possible so that the actual performance of The Rights of Woman in the agitated Dumfries theatre, as reported by Scott Douglas, seems quite probable:

At the Dumfries Theatre, under the management of Mr. Sutherland, a pretty young actress—Miss Fontenelle—formed one of the company during the winter of 1792, and also of the year following. The local newspapers announced her benefit-night for 26th November, 1792, and that after the play—The Country Girl—she would ‘deliver an occasional address, written by Mr. Robert Burns, called The Rights of Woman.’ At that period the government of this country was in great alarm regarding the spread of what were termed liberal or revolutionary opinions. Paine had produced his ‘Rights of Man,’ and Mary Wollstoncroft was advocating the ‘Rights of Woman,’ and many thought that the line, ‘Truce with kings, and truce with constitutions’— the fourth from the end in this Address, was by far too bold, and that the finishing-stroke, ça ira! was intolerable.

Chambers records, that a lady with whom he once conversed, ‘remembered being present in the theatre of Dumfries, during the heat of the Revolution, when Burns entered the pit somewhat affected by liquor. On God save the King being struck up by the band, the audience rose as usual—all except the intem-perate poet, who cried for ça ira! A tumult was the consequence, and Burns was compelled to leave the house.’ (Vol. II, p. 156)

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