Chrysti the Wordsmith > Radio Scripts

When our most carefully fashioned strategies are ruined by unforeseen events, a familiar response is to repeat the philosphical clich "well, the best laid plans of mice and men..."

This expression of resignation is another common saying extracted from the canon of English poetry. The Scots bard Robert Burns penned the verses that inspired this phrase in the late 1700s.

Robert Burns, sometimes called the "Ploughman Poet," was born to a farm family in 1759. With an early talent for writing, Burns began composing verses celebrating Scottish country life and romance while he was still a teen-ager. One windy autumn day, while Burns and his brother were plowing a piece of land, Robert spied a field mouse scurrying from a freshly turned furrow.

The small incident inspired him to compose To A Mouse, On Turning Up Her Nest with the Plough, November, 1785. In the poem, Burns apologises to the mouse for disturbing her home, forcing her to build another in the face of the coming wind and frost of winter. But, he adds philosophically, mice are not alone in experiencing such tragedies and frustrated plans, because, as he writes, "The best laid schemes o' mice an' men/Gang aft a-gley."

Though in popular speech the famous line has been altered to "the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry," the meaning remains true to Burns' original sentiments.

Radio Script > Best Laid Plans