Robert Burns: the Yemeni?

Guest blog by the Embassy Lyricist

This week the British Embassy (and millions of Scots worldwide) gathered to remember the Scottish poet Robert Burns.  Britain and Yemen’s shared love of poetry led us to think, could the 18^th century poet actually have hailed from Yemen? I’ll leave you to decide!

How can a man born in 1759 in rural Scotland have any commonality with Yemen? At first, there was little to support the hypothesis of Robert Burns being a secret Yemeni, but a journey through his poetry offers some clues… And it’s not just that wee Rabbie Burns had twelve children to a number of wives.

Scots and Yemenis share a love of what some might call a skirt: a kilt for Scots, and a mawaz or futa for Yemenis. Kilts had been banned in Scotland after the Jacobite Rebellion, and Burns came out in defence in his poem the “Jolly Beggars” a Scotsman, John Highlander, who had been sent to a penal colony for wearing his kilt

All Yemenis would share Burns’ rage that the Scots had been deprived of their right to wear their mawaz. Not only that, but Burns would see a great similarity between the highland ‘dirk’ or dagger and the ubiquitous jambiyah. Much as the jambiyah is the symbol of Yemen’s traditions, the dirk was a symbol of Highland spirit, and Burns described the Highlander in the “Address to Beelzebub” as being armed “Wi’ dirk, claymore, and rusty trigger”.

I beg his forgiveness as I adapt Burns’ 18^th century public house to the mafrajs and streets of Sana’a:

“When the peddler people leave the streets,
And craving neighbours, neighbours meet;
As market days are wearing late,
And folk begin to take the road home,
While we sit chewing strong gat,
And getting high and very happy,
We don’t think of the long Yemeni miles,
The mountains, wadis, walls and trials,
That lie between us and our home,
Where sits our sulky, sullen dame (zawja),
Gathering her brows like a gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath, to keep it warm.”   

And Yemenis would embrace Burns’ passionate defence of his nation’s freedom, mirroring their struggle against absolute monarchy, Egyptian and Ottoman invaders, and the brave supporters of democracy who crowded Change Square and the streets of Taiz in 2011. But regardless of political persuasion or era, the words of Burns’ “Scots Wha Hae” would touch many of those who have struggled in Yemen for their voices to be heard:

“Now’s the day, and now’s the hour;
See the front o’ battle lour!

Lay the proud usurpers low!
Tyrants fall in every foe!
Liberty’s in every blow—
Let us do or die!”

It is a great and powerful thing that literature written two hundred and fifty years ago can still resonate today. But Robert Burns a Yemeni? Mumkin…

Robert Burns was a Scottish poet and lyricist born in 1759.  He is widely recognised as the national poet of Scotland. Writing both in English and the Scottish dialect his work is universally enjoyed.  Burns used a combination of his wit and humble rural upbringing, the son of a ploughman from rural Ayrshire, to transcend social classes in his commentary on social justice.  His work is said to be as relevant today as it was in the 18^th century.  Ever year on the 25^th of January Scots mark Burns’ birth with an evening of festivities which incorporate both his poetry and other hallmarks of Scottish culture, these include reciting poetry, drinking whisky and eating haggis.