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Guy Fawkes Night Makeover

November 5th! To Guy Fawkes let’s be kind—
no burning him in effigy this year.
His hanged-and-drawn-and-quartered doom I find
excessive; let’s reverse his fate most drear!
His body parts (grim warnings to be loyal)
return to London where they recombine.
His entrails get un-burned, restored and foil
the dogs which on his innards hoped to dine.
The gallows’ swinging corpse becomes unhanged;
un-torturing the traitor happens next,
uncaptured too, while drums of war un-banged
and words, unsaid, no longer get him vexed.
From man, to lad, to child, to guiltless tot,
the plotter’s laid down slumbering in his cot.

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Poet’s Note

Guy Fawkes Night, occurring in Britain every November 5th, commemorates the thwarting of ‘The Gunpowder Plot’ to assassinate England’s Protestant king, James I, in 1605.

Guy Fawkes was captured in a rented cellar beneath the House of Lords, where he was guarding stockpiled barrels of gunpowder. The plan was to light the fuse during the Opening of Parliament ceremony, blow up James I, and appoint a Catholic monarch.

The eight captured plotters were to be hanged, drawn and quartered, though Guy Fawkes escaped the worst of this punishment by jumping from the scaffold with the rope around his neck, causing instant death. His co-conspirators, however, suffered having their genitals cut off and burnt before their eyes (as, presumably, did Guy Fawkes after death), and their bowels and heart removed before being decapitated. Then, after dismemberment, their body parts were displayed so that they might become ‘prey for the fowls of the air’.

Named after the Gunpowder Plot’s most well-known plotter, Guy Fawkes Night is celebrated in Britain with fireworks and a bonfire topped with an effigy of Guy Fawkes, the burning of which is the culmination of the event and warms the participants up no end on a cold November evening.

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Paul A. Freeman is the author of Rumours of Ophir, a crime novel which was taught in Zimbabwean high schools and has been translated into German. In addition to having two novels, a children’s book and an 18,000-word narrative poem (Robin Hood and Friar Tuck: Zombie Killers!) commercially published, Paul is the author of hundreds of published short stories, poems and articles.

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12 Responses

  1. Roy Eugene Peterson

    Interesting bit of history for those of us who live in the U.S. Thank you for the notes. I knew what happened from my history classes, but the details you gave were needed by me.

    Reply
    • Paul A. Freeman

      Glad you got so much out of the poem and the notes, Roy.

      Thanks for reading.

      Reply
  2. Warren Bonham

    My history classes weren’t as good as Roy’s. I had heard the name Guy Fawkes but knew nothing about the punishment inflicted upon him and his co-conspirators. I’m surprised the J6ers weren’t given the Guy Fawkes treatment.

    Working backwards as you did was very clever. There are a lot of eggs we’d be better off unscrambling if it were possible to do so.

    Reply
    • Paul A. Freeman

      Thanks for reading and commenting, Warren. I love your final sentence.

      Reply
    • Paul A. Freeman

      As a kid, we just accepted the burning in effigy of Guy Fawkes, without realising what it was all about. It was also a time when you could go begging with your effigy (Guy), without fear of being banged up by the Old Bill.

      Reply
  4. Margaret Coats

    Paul, may the Gunpowder Plot (whatever it really was) rest in peace along with your Guy Fawkes restored to guiltlessness. I was intrigued to discover recently that November 5 was a day of brawls centuries earlier. Annually on this date in the 1100’s Oxford University students set out to “lick a lord and thrash a cad” in vicious battles with the rough and tough young men of the town of Oxford. Some scholars disliked this practice so much that they left and founded the other university town of Cambridge in 1209. “Town and gown rows” were still going on in the 19th century, though far less violently. What the participants all need, it seems, is vigorous outdoor exercise and the warmth of a good bonfire!

    Reply
    • Paul A. Freeman

      As always, Margaret, you’re a mine of fascinating information. From the Miller’s Tale we get the idea that students at Oxford haven’t changed much. What a Canterbury Tale ‘Lick a Lord and Thrash a Cad Day’ could have been.

      I do have fond memories of ‘Bonfire Night’ as a kid, even though the weather was often freezing.

      Thanks for reading.

      Reply
  5. Susan Jarvis Bryant

    Paul, thank you for this history lesson with a twist… I like the way you play with time to make a point.

    Reply
    • Paul A. Freeman

      Thanks for reading and commenting, Susan.

      Of course these days the Guy Fawkes likeness and mask is familiar around the world due to the film ‘V for Vendetta’, though not Fawkes’s story.

      Reply
  6. Jeff Eardley

    Paul, great to read with childhood memories for me. Nowadays the “Penny for the Guy” has pretty much gone, and many bonfires have been lit on the 2nd or 9th for commercial reasons. Pet owners are furious at this. Our local bonfire is always on the fifth, which is where it should be. Nice to give old Guido a break with an excellent read. Thank you.

    Reply
    • Paul A. Freeman

      As a kid, I used to do ‘Penny for the Guy’. I suppose these days, not wanting to be done for begging or vagrancy, and worries about blokes in white vans, kids have stopped this practice.

      It’s a shame that Bonfire Night’s been commercialised so much. The 5th’s the 5th, no matter what, even an American election.

      And pity the pets: They’re scaring all the cats. They’re scaring all the dogs,’ to paraphrase a former and future president.

      Reply

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