Beard Liberation Front
25th Jan
Contact Keith flett 07803 167266
CAMPAIGNERS SET TO CELEBRATE RABBIE BURNS UNSHAVED
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that with the annual celebration of the life and poetry of Robert Burns due on Wednesday, it is ready to celebrate the Bard Unshaved.
The campaign group says that while Burns appears clean shaven in official portraits and clearly felt Establishment pressure to appear without a beard, there is some evidence that suggests that for much of the week he was unshaven
The BLF says that some of Burn’s shaving implements have survived and there is no doubt that he did shave. However in late eighteenth century Scotland it would have been an unusual for anyone but the very wealthy to shave every day meaning that for a good part of the week
This was a society with no artificial light and over a century before the safety razor was invented. At this time of year natural light for shaving would have been very limited.
In a poem dedicated to his publisher William Smellie in 1787, Burns underlined the point:
‘Twas four long nights and days to shaving night’
pointing clearly to the practice of occasional shaving and frequent beard wearing
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said we’ll be raising a glass to the unshaven Rabbie Burns on Wednesday, in the knowledge that this is truer to the image of the poet than the official clean shaven portraits that exist.
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