At the risk of thread "drift", I would like to add that I heard on the TV some time ago a Burns expert reciting a poem in what he told us was Burns's native Ayrshire accent/dialect and even to someone who admires Burns it was really quite hard to like it. It has always been the case that there is ambivalence about Scots dialects amongst Scottish people: some find Burns on the page very powerful and worthy of emulation, and yet, at the same time. regard,say, a Glasgwegian accent as risible.

   Anyway, it is good to see him the subject of debate.