Americans, for the most part, know that there’s any significance to this date–the 5th of November–from the movie “V for Vendetta” and the graphic novel it was based on. It is, however, a popular fall holiday in Britain, a week-long celebration of bonfires and fireworks, grander in many ways than our 4th of July in America.
But what is it all about?
The character at the center of all this fall revelry is actually a villain, not a vigilante, named Guy Fawkes, but if you’ve seen the movie you know that already. You might also know that Fawkes attempted to blow up the British parliament in 1605. He was a terrorist, by definition, and part of a wider conspiracy known as the Gunpowder Plot. That act of 17th century terrorism, of course, failed, and the foiling of the plot is what all these celebrations are about.
In “V for Vendetta”, Fawkes’ motivation and aims are glazed over in favor of portraying a character who took action for what he believed in. The truth is that Fawkes and his conspirators where Catholics wanting to rewind the English Reformation. For seventy years, since Henry VIII’s split with Rome, England had been in religious turmoil. Fawkes, a Catholic convert, had spent time fighting against Dutch Protestants in the Eighty Years War. Afterwards he had traveled to Spain to attempt to rally support for a Catholic uprising back home in England. Spain wasn’t willing to start a war with England, so Fawkes turned to his famed foiled plot to assassinate King James I and restore a Catholic monarch.
Fawkes was caught and stood trial with seven of his co-conspirators. Under torture they confessed, so naturally they were found guilty at trial. They were dragged by horses through the streets, hanged, and quartered, their parts distributed throughout the kingdom as a warning to anyone else considering treason.
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| Guy Fawkes (from TheSchoolRun.com) |
Should we manage to find ourselves at a Guy Fawkes night bonfire and fireworks celebration tonight or one day this week, we’ll tweet and post pictures on Facebook.
