ROBERT Burns has always been seen in a certain way:

he was the great poet inspired by Scotland, nature and women; he was the drinker, the man about town, the lover.

But that image may be about to change in one important respect with the launch yesterday of a major investigation into the poet's mental health and specifically the question of whether he had bipolar disorder.

It has been suggested before that Burns might have suffered from depression but yesterday was the first time experts from literature and psychiatry have come together to look at the evidence for bipolar disorder, or manic depression as it is also known, and taken the first steps to systematically studying whether he had the condition. His letters, poems and other work, as well as his genetic history, will now be sifted through for evidence.

Yesterday's gathering of experts, which was organised by the University of Glasgow, was held at the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons in Glasgow and was attended by, among others, Professor Gerard Carruthers, co-director of the Centre for Robert Burns Studies, and the psychiatrist Dr Daniel Smith, who teaches at the university and is an advisor to bipolar charities.

Both Professor Carruthers and Dr Smith believe there is considerable circumstantial evidence that Burns had manic depression and that it should be investigated further. Professor Carruthers said some of Burns' letters provided particularly good evidence for manic depression, which is characterised by manic highs and depressive lows.

"If you look at the letters and the prose," he said, "some of it looks like depression, especially the letters he wrote while an apprentice flax maker in Irvine in his 20s. He talks about being in hell and his nerves being shot and he seems to be speaking about suicide. But there are also other moments in the letters where he seems to be in a high state of excitement."

Dr Smith also believes the evidence is strong enough to warrant further investigation. "There is no concrete evidence that he had bipolar disorder," he said, "but he had severe episodes of depression or melancholia as it was known. His father also had depression and there's also the irregularity of his relationships."

Dr Smith said the aim now was to carry out a systematic study of the data to rule manic depression in or out. "Burns's physical health has been assessed in enormous detail but his mental health has never been subject to the same study and that's what we're interested in doing. What we are after is a more accurate view of him."

This will be achieved by looking at Burns' writing, his patterns of working, but also the genetic history of his family.

"He had 13 offspring and no-one has really documented how they did in terms of their mental health and you would expect at least one or two of them to have had major issues with mood problems if Burns had ­bipolar. We can also map periods when he might have been depressed or overactive with the amount and nature of his output."

The Centre for Robert Burns Studies will be involved in the initial research and money is being sought to fund a PhD student to research the subject.

Both Professor Carruthers and Dr Smith believe the research has the potential not only to change Burns' image but also to reduce the stigma of manic depression.

"Maybe we will see Burns as a different force of nature - a force of a disordered or not entirely normal brain," said Professor Carruthers. "But if you begin to speculate that the national bard might have been depressive, it could also increase acceptance of mental health issues."