I really enjoyed Burns’ renewal of the old folk song “John
Barleycorn. A Ballad.” The fact that it was rewritten after the 1707 Acts of
Union actually gives it quite a bit more meaning in my opinion. Other than the
title, there is really no indication that the poem is not about an actual person, which may speak to the brutality of the
creation of Great Britain and the wars between Scotland and England that
preceded it. Barley and corn are the main ingredients in making beer and some
liquor, which will both apparently “make a man forget his woe” and “heighten
all his joy.” The way that these crops are cultivated are rather violent, and
translate well into the brutalizing of a Scot whose “blood” and “great
posterity/ Ne’er fail in old Scotland!” Perhaps I am wrong, but I think that
the very reinventing of this ballad, as well as its content may be a subtle jab
or an even more subtle acknowledgement of the English reaping what the Scots
had sown.
I also was thinking that Burns was referring to alcohol or spirits in this poem when he was describing how it invigorated the people. However, I also thought that the character of John Barleycorn might also have been symbolic of a tree because of the way he is described as growing in the spring and summer and withering away in the fall, just like the leaves of a tree would do.
ReplyDeleteIt does seem that John Barleycorn's character is meant to invoke some connection to the natural progression from growth to cultivation. I felt like it represents actual barley and corn though, rather than a tree, since Scotland was and is well known for these crops and the alcohol they can produce. In any event, Burns' use of these images is quite telling. He uses traditional Scottish crops to suggest the imposition of Scottish culture into England upon their union in 1707. Thus, although England often took advantage of Scotland as in the first 12 stanzas of "John Barleycorn," he is "a hero bold,/Of noble enterprise" by its conclusion with England taking on Scottish spirit through agriculture.
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