So today is the anniversay of what could have been the most effective terrorist attack ever...

[Gramm838]

so why in England do we now concentrate more on the (American) holiday of Halloween (and yes I know it didn't start in America, but still)?

 

[The Ace]

Because Fawkes wanted to, 'Blow the King back to Scotland.' Have you any idea how long it took us to get rid of the b*st*rd ?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Hallow'een isn't an American holiday - the rest of the UK have been celebrating it all along and know very little about Guy Fawkes! I suspect England celebrated it before Guy Fawkes took precedence at around the same time.

Perhaps one is a historical event and one is a cultural entity that's been in place for a very long time (since the dark ages) and all historical events fade over time where embedded cultures and beliefs don't. But it's too simplistic to blame the Americans when we celts are equally to blame!

 

[Venusian Broon]

I see it still as a UK event, but...

When I was a wee 'un, yes - you dressed up and went round the neighbouring houses, but you were supposed to earn your sweets - tell (crap) jokes, sing a (crap) song (badly), do a (crap) magic trick or whatever. None of this trick or treat stuff, turn up and expect to be given stuff. Possibly the far cleverer young 'uns that follow my generation see the American version as a lot easier.

Actually I prefer Halloween to Guy Fawkes night, cause we have to suffer months of little a***holes setting off fireworks. As Matthew Wright said on his show today, there were times he was going to work in his car through East London and loads of gangs were firing fireworks at the cars - he likened it to the scene from Apocalypse Now (when they reach the last US outpost on the river.)

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Halloween is really a Celtic Holiday, commercialised by America.
Turnip lanterns please, not Pumpkins!

 

[Dinosaur]

Well we once had a great tradition of bonfires, burning stuff and explosives for almost every occasion, and over the years these events have crystallized into bonfire night. Probably because of the Victorians or WW2 who seem to be the blame for most such things.

 

[Gramm838]

Hallow'een isn't an American holiday - the rest of the UK have been celebrating it all along and know very little about Guy Fawkes! I suspect England celebrated it before Guy Fawkes took precedence at around the same time.

Perhaps one is a historical event and one is a cultural entity that's been in place for a very long time (since the dark ages) and all historical events fade over time where embedded cultures and beliefs don't. But it's too simplistic to blame the Americans when we celts are equally to blame!

I have no recollection of ever celebrating Halloween when I was a real young'un in the early '60's - but i do remember doing 'penny for the guy' for many years - so although I accept that Halloween was a pre-American pagan celebration, I still think it has become synonymous with America...and don't get me started on the craze for American style 'baby-showers' nowadays!

 

[AnyaKimlin]

All Hallows Eve and its various incarnations followed by All Hallows Day has been around longer than the United States Guising, knock a door night etc are Celtic traditions they may not be English but certainly in Scotland it was celebrated in various forms and was probably the origin of the American trick or treat.

We don't do penny for a guy (burning Roman Catholics is not really very PC) but we have bonfire night every year with a cake, toffee apples, stew etc Its not changed much since I was a kid.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Besides, it's easier to get kids excited about Halloween because they can be involved in everything - dressing up, party, food, adventure - as opposed to Bonfire Night with fires and fireworks they're not supposed to be allowed to play with.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I have no recollection of ever celebrating Halloween when I was a real young'un in the early '60's - but i do remember doing 'penny for the guy' for many years - so although I accept that Halloween was a pre-American pagan celebration, I still think it has become synonymous with America...and don't get me started on the craze for American style 'baby-showers' nowadays!

Well, the gunpowder plot predated the sixties somewhat...

Actually, I'd argue Guy Fawke's night is the misnomer and the new-fangled travesty? in the 70s here we had Hallow'een (and were advised by Blue Peter how not to burn ourselves three days after we had because they issued sparkler and firework* advice for Guy Fawkes and not Hallow'een) well established with rhyming, turnip lanterns as Ray pointed out, and parties with apple pies with coins in it. There's nothing American about it here except the hideous trick or treat (although my kids know the Halloween rhyme which in England is a Christmas rhyme, and we do now use pumpkins cos they're less smelly than turnips, frankly. And I can make soup with them....)

* although they're technically illegal here** and were during my childhood due to a propensity of the locals to chuck them at the police

** and yet everyone has them in their back garden and no one I know has been arrested yet...

 

[AnyaKimlin]

and we do now use pumpkins cos they're less smelly than turnips, frankly. And I can make soup with them....)

And a lot easier to carve. I used to have a swede as a kid - Dad did it faithfully every year.

 

[The Ace]

Funny that. I could eat raw neep until the cows came home, but the cooked stuff makes me sick. I actually liked the smell of candle-singed turnip, it added to the occasion, and our version of, 'The Gypsy Rover,' used to bring the house down.

 

[Venusian Broon]

We don't do penny for a guy (burning Roman Catholics is not really very PC) but we have bonfire night every year with a cake, toffee apples, stew etc Its not changed much since I was a kid.

I have to say from my childhood experiences of Auld Reekie I never, ever saw penny for a guy - and that the town bonfire was always, every year, set on fire and burnt by a***hole kids well before the 5th of November. Always a fireworks display though, which was 10 minutes of oohh and aaahhs after standing in a cold farmers field freezing toes off for a good half an hour...

Yeah all the fun stuff, bobbing for apples, dressing up, getting presents was in the Halloween 'festivities'. It has not occurred to me till now that it was sort of a celtic fringe thing, but perhaps it was/is.

Ace - totally agree on cooked turnip, only celery beats it in 'tastes utterly foul' stakes for me.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Tripe, turnip and Cauliflower. Bleagh!
But I'm no fan of anything made from Pumpkin either.
I always thought Guy Fawkes was a very south of England thing. I lived in UK more than 20 years (not in England) and never encountered Guy Fawkes except on TV, history class (once) and Radio. Locally was only Halloween. Apples hanging on cords, Apples in basins of water, pies with thruppenies and a sixpence, turnip lantern, sparklers, fireworks (before they became illegal). The coins well wrapped to avoid tainting the pie. Any dressing up was home made, often the masks too as well as maybe shop bought masks. Rarely ever a bonefire. That was 11th July.
In Southern Ireland I think the fireworks were always illegal, but people had them anyway and the pie usually replaced by Barmbrack loaf with a ring or coin (The Halloween Barmbrack loaf with a ring are still sold here). In this part of Ireland the Bealtaine bonefire to mark the Celtic season of Summer starting (1st May) is a big thing, it never died out here.

Halloween is the Catholic "All Saint's Eve" before All Saints day, an attempt to Christianise the Pagan / Celtic Samhain
Traditionally it would have had bonefires. Also traditionally, Bealtaine and Samhain were "bigger" than Midsummer or Midwinter. Ireland doesn't "Celebrate" Guy Fawkes. I always thought it odd that the Loyalists in N.I. didn't Celebrate Guy Fawkes.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Also we had nuts and a Coconut. No idea why a Coconut.
Christmas always a box of dates.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Ah yes, the coconuts. Why? Why? In Ireland. At Hallow'een. I was nearly indoctinated enough to buy one last week...

 

[alchemist]

In this part of Ireland the Bealtaine bonefire to mark the Celtic season of Summer starting (1st May) is a big thing, it never died out here.

In my part, the west, June 23rd was Bonfire Night when I was a boy. Halloween was about bobbing for apples, eating nuts and barm bracks rather than costumes and dressing up.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

the coconuts. Why? Why? In Ireland. At Hallow'een

Some sort of alien influence.
Even as a child it puzzled me. Hazelnuts are at least a traditional Irish thing, though peanuts are as mad as Coconuts. They are not even nuts!

 

[paranoid marvin]

Some sort of alien influence.
Even as a child it puzzled me. Hazelnuts are at least a traditional Irish thing, though peanuts are as mad as Coconuts. They are not even nuts!

I blame it on migrating swallows.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

Halloween ("All Hallows Eve") is the Christianised version of Samhain, which, in its original form anyway, is much older than JC.