Burns - MR Thomas Crawford

'Thomas Crawford's book is one of the outstanding twentieth century contributions to Burns studies. It combines scholarly erudition with critical passion, and securely places Burns's poetry on the world stage. Casting new light on all the major poetry and song, this book is essential reading for Burns scholars, students, and the non-specialist alike'. Nigel Leask, Regius Professor of English Language and Literature, University of Glasgow Tom Crawford spent the first part of his academic career in New Zealand at the University of Auckland. He returned to Scotland in 1965, and after a brief spell as Lecturer in English at Edinburgh, moved to Aberdeen where he became Senior Lecturer and subsequently Reader in English Literature until his retiral in 1985. He is an outstanding figure among the first generation of scholars who devoted their entire careers to the study of Scottish Literature. His Burns: a study of the Poems and Songs appeared originally in 1960, while later works include Love, Labour, and Liberty (1976), Society and the Lyric (1980), Boswell, Burns and the French Revolution (1990) and Volume One of The Correspondence of James Boswell and William Johnson Temple 1756-1795 (1997).