"To A Mouse," Or "To the Self": A Literary Analysis of Burns's Famed 1785 Poem

    Robert Burns’s poem “To a Mouse'' is often praised for the way that the speaker’s thoughtful consideration of the rodent bridges the gap between man and animal. The speaker is not only sympathetic toward the mouse after unearthing her home, but also seemingly empathetic to the shared hardships of “Mice an’ Men”--hunger, housing, and the unpredictability of the future (line 39). Though the speaker’s understanding for the creature seems to build throughout the poem, I believe that the final stanza is a turn meant to juxtapose our sense of mice and men’s mutual understanding. This final stanza pulls us, and the speaker, from empathy, leaving a somewhat disappointing sense that mankind cannot wholly connect to animals/nature and see the fullness of life that other species experience. Despite the leaps that the speaker makes to relate to the mouse, he ultimately leaves the poem on a note of self-concern, representing an underlying disconnect regardless of intention to bridge a gap.

    Before delving into the speaker’s direct address to a mouse, it is important to establish who this speaker is. Without explicitly describing his identity, we get the sense that the speaker is a lower class working man from other details in the poem. The full title of the poem provides a lot of context: “To a Mouse, On Turning up in Her Nest with the Plough, November 1785.” Not only does this title ground us in a setting--the year 1785, presumably in a field, as it is being plowed--but it also offers insight to the speaker, as we can assume he is a fieldworker with his familiarity of the plough. This context, as well as the speaker’s ability to identify shared needs and hardships between himself and the mouse later in the poem, establish the speaker as a lower class farmhand, someone likely familiar with poverty--someone who may feel at the bottom of the food chain of people/class in the same way that mice are at the bottom of their food chain. Burns himself was from a poor family and also familiar with such hardships, and while speaker and poet are viewed separately, this background likely influenced the poem and is worth taking into consideration. With the speaker established, we can turn to his message to the mouse.

Others are not wrong to call attention to the speaker’s consideration of the rodent. The first several stanzas offer much compassion for the mouse that many would consider to be a pest. For example, the second stanza is an excellent aid for the interpretation of the speaker as empathetic and understanding of the mouse:

I’m truly sorry Man’s dominion

Has broken Nature’s social union,

An’ justifies that ill opinion,

       Which makes thee startle,

At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,

       An’ fellow-mortal! (7-12)

 

These lines, though short, accomplish much. Firstly, the speaker recognizes and apologizes for the way that humans have destroyed the natural harmony which should exist between humans and nature. This is made clear in lines 7-8 with “Man” representing humans as a whole, both in this poem and several times within this paper, as man/mankind often stands in for human/humankind. We see the destruction of harmony in the way Man “has broken…social union” (8). This sincere apology stands out and gives the speaker a depth beyond his own actions by apologizing on behalf of mankind for our collective breakdown of natural harmony. The apology is significant on its own, but the speaker’s empathy for the mouse shines even brighter in lines 11-12 as the speaker raises the mouse to his same level: “... earth-born companion, / An’ fellow-mortal!”. Though the apology seems as if man dominates nature through our power to break nature down, the speaker does not flaunt status or power over the mouse--he views the mouse as his equal, mortal companion. Stanzas like this do speak to the perspective that the speaker is empathetic and able to connect with this mouse: he sees the wrongdoings of mankind, apologizes for this, and addresses the mouse as an equal. These thoughtful moments are not to be overlooked; they are equally as important to our understanding of our relationship with nature and ourselves as the final stanza’s turn.

The seventh stanza deserves a close analysis as it curiously works to support both interpretations that we are discussing in relation to the poem. At first glance, it seems to follow suit with the stanza discussed above by drawing more comparisons between “Mice an’ Men” that weigh them as equals, but it also includes a small detail that is crucial to the last stanza and our understanding of the poem as a whole (39). The stanza is as follows:

But Mousie, thou art no thy-lane,

In proving foresight may be vain:

The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men

       Gang aft agley,

An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,

       For promis’d joy! (37-42)

 

Here, the speaker once again brings humans and animals together by explaining that the mouse is not the only one whose plans for the future are made in vain. The plans (“best laid schemes”) of both “Mice an’ Men” often go wrong, leaving both parties with “grief an’ pain” (39-41). “Often go wrong” is a translation from Scottish of line 40’s “Gang aft agley,” with “Gang” meaning to go, “aft” functioning like “oft” (as in “often”), and “agley” meaning wrong. The speaker, being a working man himself and vulnerable to hunger and homelessness despite best preparations, expresses that these conditions are true for mice as well--that they share the same struggles of an unpredictable future. So far, nothing about this stanza seems amiss, but moving forward we must remember that the speaker has stated that mice, like men, have “foresight” and “[lay] schemes” (38-39).

This brings us to the eighth and final stanza, where we see a clear shift away from empathy as this stanza is the most blatantly self centered of the speaker and mankind as an extension. Despite all of the work done to relate to the mouse, the speaker now turns inward and more or less dismisses the complexity of the mouse’s struggles:

Still, thou art blest, compar’d wi’ me!

The present only toucheth thee:

But Och! I backward cast my e’e,

       On prospects drear!

An’ forward tho’ I canna see,

       I guess an’ fear! (43-48)

 

Though the speaker has destroyed the mouse’s home and has spent the last seven stanzas apologizing and attempting to relate to the rodent, he now appears to backtrack by expressing that the mouse is comparatively blessed because mice are only affected by the present, while the speaker--and mankind in general--is affected by the past (“I backward cast my e’e”) and the future (“forward tho’ I canna see”) as well (45-47). There are two issues with this sentiment: the first being that this stanza contradicts what the speaker has said in the previous one, and the second being that the poem ends on this note of expressing hardships faced by men but not by mice when a well-rounded and true consideration of the mouse would have explored the hardships faced by mice and not by men.

The contradiction between the last two stanzas lies in the speaker’s seventh stanza assertion that mice, like men, have “foresight” and make future plans, which he then seems to disregard by stating “The present only” affects mice while the speaker looks to the future (38, 44). If the mouse has the foresight to plan, and if the mouse has plans at all, then she must have the capacity to look toward the future. This contradiction clashes with the speaker’s past compassion and undermines the mouse and the hardships that she endures. Without the speaker’s prior mention of foresight and schemes, this might be a matter of ignorance, but the poet’s inclusion of this direct contradiction points to it holding a purpose.

Beyond this contradiction, the speaker comes across as self centered in this final stanza for the way that he has drawn attention to the shared struggles of mice and men and what he considers to be struggles exclusive to men, yet never explores the struggles that are exclusive to mice. The speaker never reaches to think of stressors like the fear of a murderous predator (because we don’t fear a barn cat eating us), nor an oversized plough demolishing our homes in an instant. In these situations, humans are “blest, compar’d” to mice, yet the speaker only takes up additional concern for issues he sees as exclusive to mankind (43).

Though many applaud this poem for the speaker’s ability to relate to the mouse, extending to a larger metaphor of humans relating to other animals, the last stanza leaves ample room for a less satisfying interpretation in which man’s own self-regarding thoughts are confused with true empathy for animals. The shift to (what are thought to be) the unshared hardships of man reveals that self concern was the speaker’s ultimate focus, as the mouse’s hardships were only relevant when they were those hardships shared with men. Given the speaker’s probable identity as a low class worker and the mouse’s similar animal-world status at the bottom of the food chain, it is likely that the speaker sees himself in the mouse and uses her as a mirror to reflect on the speaker’s own hardships. This would explain the note of self concern that the poem leaves us on, and offers reason for Burns’s inclusion of the contradiction as an entry point into questioning the speaker’s empathy and thought process. Though the speaker positions the mouse as an equal, she is only equal when she can reflect the speaker’s hardships, and dismissed beyond this. “To a Mouse” simply uses the mouse as a means of reflection and projection for the speaker, speaking more to the ways that we use nature as a lens to understand ourselves than to truly bridge our gap with animals. To read this poem in full and form your own opinions on the piece, you can find it here on Poetry Foundation.