The excitement of Guy Fawkes Night is fast approaching, and once again I have mixed feelings. As a child, I loved bonfires and fireworks, but now I worry about the distress caused to wildlife and pets and the possible consequences for the environment. Naturally, none of that bothered me when I was little because I was busy having fun.
Back then there was ample space to build fires and plenty of things to burn. Tree branches, old fertiliser sacks and worn-out tyres made for good fires, although the black acrid smoke had a way of leaving eyes stinging, and adult tempers frayed! Each year my brother, sister and I would begin with a small pile of rubbish and watch as the mound grew ever larger. Looking back I’m sure everyone in the village had a hand in it, although at the time I was convinced magic was afoot! Living on a farm, we built our fires in open fields making them readily available to anyone with rubbish to burn.
For me, the real excitement began with the arrival of the fireworks. We usually had a large selection box with at least a few extra rockets and several packets of sparklers. When the night finally arrived, we made sure Peggy our dog and Kosset the cat were inside. Then it was time to don wellies, hats, coats, scarves and gloves all the while feeling the excitement building. Much pushing and shoving ensued as we put left feet into right boots and gloves on backwards, eventually, we would sort ourselves out and make a dash for the back door. In my memory, it was always really cold on bonfire night just as it was hot and dry in the summer. Can that be or is it my memory playing tricks?
Once we were all warmly dressed it was time for the lighting of the bonfire, often helped by a can or two of petrol! Finally, the biscuit tins where the fireworks were kept would be opened, and dad would ‘light the blue touch paper and retire’. Now the waiting … would it be a Rocket, a Roman candle, a Falling Rain or a Jumping Jack? Do you remember Jumping Jacks? They always had us running for cover, no wonder they are now banned.
The Catherine Wheels were sometimes a bit of a disappointment, either they whizzed off the nails and spluttered out in the damp grass, or they refused to turn at all. Many were the times my dad or my brother approached a lit Catherine Wheel and tried to give it a push or even attempted to loosen the nail holding it to the fence. It’s a miracle they didn’t end up with burnt fingers or worse.
All too soon the fireworks were over, and it was time to hunt the potatoes languishing in the embers of the fire. We did this by prodding at the fire with sticks while at the same time trying to ‘hook’ the potatoes sideways away from the heat. By now, they would be burnt black on the outside, but soft and flavoursome inside. At the end of the evening Dad would be left on 'fire duty' while the rest of us went inside for warm drinks. Then it was off to bed and the comfort of hot-water bottles to thaw out frozen toes.
When our son Steven was born, we once again built fires, watched Rockets and Falling Rain, held sparklers and ate baked potatoes. Only now the fires were smaller as befitting a housing estate and there was no petrol involved! Spent sparklers were plunged into water to make sure they were properly out and potatoes were pre-baked in the oven and wrapped in foil. A few years later, we were blessed with grandsons, and the rituals began again. The boys are grown up now, and our two small granddaughters live in Australia. Organised bonfires seem to be the order of the day. Some of our neighbours might have a few fireworks in their gardens, but I doubt any of them will light a bonfire.
In childhood the daylight always fails too soon—except when there are going to be fireworks; and then the sun dawdles intolerably on the threshold like a tedious guest.~Jan Struther Do you have plans for November 5th, or memories of past Bonfire Nights? If you don’t celebrate Guy Fawkes Night are there any other occasions when you enjoy fireworks? Maybe you don’t like fireworks? I would love to hear from you so please leave a comment.
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Photograph Twitter (@metoffice) Don't forget to check for sleeping hedgehogs before lighting your bonfire this Bonfire Night.
The conspirators in what we now know as the Gunpowder Plot failed in their aspiration to blow up the House of Lords on the occasion of the state opening of parliament in the hope of killing the King and a multitude of peers. Why do we continue to remember the plot? The bonfires no longer articulate anti-Roman Catholicism, though this attitude formally survived until 2013 in the prohibition against the monarch or the heir to the throne marrying a Catholic.
The post The literary fortunes of the Gunpowder Plot appeared first on OUPblog.
The fifth of November is not just an excuse to marvel at sparklers, fireworks, and effigies; it is part of a national tradition that is based on one of the most famous moments in British political history. The Gunpowder Plot itself was actually foiled on the night of Monday 4 November, 1605. However, throughout the following day, Londoners were asked to light bonfires in order to celebrate the failure of the assassination attempt on King James I of England. Henceforth, the fifth of November has become known as ‘Bonfire Night’ or even ‘Guy Fawkes Night’ – named after the most posthumously famous of the thirteen conspirators. Guy Fawkes became the symbol for the conspirators after being caught during the failed treason attempt. For centuries after 1605, boys creating a cloaked effigy – based on Guy Fawkes’ disguised appearance in the Vaults at the House of Lords – have been asking for “a penny for the Guy”.
Below is a timeline that describes the events leading up to the failed Gunpowder Plot and the execution of Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators. If you would like to learn more about Bonfire Night, you can explore the characters behind the Gunpowder Plot, the traditions associated with it, or simply learn how to throw the best Guy Fawkes Night party.
Feature image credit: Guy Fawkes, by Crispijn van de Passe der Ältere. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.
The post A history of Bonfire Night and the Gunpowder Plot appeared first on OUPblog.
posted by Neil
Last year, the winner of the Moth auction of "tea with Neil Gaiman" met me for tea, and it all went a bit wrong.
The winner was the mother of a very nice young lady, and she had paid $4,400 for her daughter to have tea with me (all the money goes to support
The Moth, which is something I love and care about: people telling true stories about their lives. Check out their
podcast). Unfortunately, when the nice young lady and I went to the tea place they explained that they'd never heard of us, and for that matter they didn't even serve tea, and it all went so wrong that I took the young lady in question up to DC Comics (she had told me that she loved comics, Vertigo in particular, and wanted to edit comics when she graduated) and then DC Publisher Paul Levitz, who was passing by, gave her an hour's masterclass in matters editorial and said something about a summer internship.
I saw her at the signing for the
Year's Best American Comics last month and the young lady told me that she'd just done a summer's internship at DC Comics, and loved it, and that the failed tea had been a wonderful thing better than any actual tea could possibly have been, and she was incredibly happy and grateful..
I cannot guarantee you that the tea with me this year will go anywhere nearly as wrong as that. But the Moth are at it again. Also, you could be a "neighbourhood person" in the
Onion.
https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/Browse.action?auctionId=120612926...
I don't do much journalism any more, and I do even less book reviewing (I think the last book I reviewed was
the Annotated Grimm's Fairytales for the New York Times, six years ago), but if I'm not reviewing at all I feel guilty, as if I am no longer being part of the cultural dialogue, so I just reviewed Stephen King's
Full Dark, No Stars for the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/nov/05/full-dark-stephen-king-review.
I'm happy to say that I liked it.
....
I turn fifty on Wednesday. Ivy Ratafia gets in there early, with a birthday LJ post for me.
And I am putting it up here because Ivy answers one of the great questions of the universe here, viz.
Which were the nine true panels in this two-page comic? In 17 years, no-one has been able to guess it correctly.
You should probably read the comic first before you read Ivy's explanation. It comes from a 1993 "Roast" comic done for the Chicago Comic Convention, and was drawn by Scott McCloud and written by Scott and Ivy.
...
I really don't do much journalism, and I'm amused to see that the only pieces I've done in so long are both being published-on-the-web on the same day. Since I typed that first paragraph, SPIN MAGAZINE just posted an article I wrote for them yesterday.
They asked me to review the Dresden Dolls Hallowe'en show.
I'm not sure that that was quite what I gave them, although it's that as well. I'm happy with it, and I'm not normally happy
