Tonight is bonfire night when we celebrate the foiling of a plot to blow up the King and his parliament on this day in 1605, this is done by having bonfires and letting off fireworks at public or private displays. What I had not realised until recently is that for over 250 years the celebrations were compulsory by royal decree.
Even more surprising was that they had their 36 barrels of gunpowder in a rented cellar under the House of Lords for 8 months before their plans ran off the rails.
Might appear odd to celebrate a failed explosion plot by burning large piles of wood and filling the sky with colourful explosions, but I suppose that it is traditional. Have always enjoyed a good outdoor display under a cold clear autumn night – not much chance of that tonight as it has been a dreich overcast day.
Here is an 8 min display from London a year ago that was set to music – enjoy.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Very nice. :)
That was quite a plot cooked up. Do they still burn effigies of Guy Fawkes? (I read your post, but my memory is bad the past few days...sorry if I'm asking you to repeat yourself.)
rt, Some still do burn him, others chose more topical people to burn in effigy like this pair whose recent faux pas may not have reached you over there.
I know who Russell Brand is. He's been on several late night chat shows. He was funny on those, because he had to be restrained from his usual juvenile humor. After they got thrown off the air, Brand went to Los Angeles to try out "new" material and he got heckled about what happened in the UK.
That's interesting that they would be the subject of "burning," though. However, I guess they messed with the wrong guy. :)
Post a Comment