A wee tale from me, too. But first...There is a level at which the guy has become totally separated from any historical base - it is a word for a stuffed mass of old clothes with a mask. About as believable as the tooth fairy. Children who ask for a penny for the guy seldom have any idea of the origins. One year, a supply teacher in my class did decide to do the story, including descriptions of torture, and took down my display to put up the results. I was hopping mad. (On this subject, at a secondary level, there is a part of the public records office site which discusses the issue. HREF=http://learningcurve.pro.gov.uk/snapshots/snapshot07/snapshot7.htm>Guy Fawkes Anyway, the story. My family had moved to Dover, and shortly after we arrived, another family of girls moved next door, and we started to play together, and the families to do things together. They were Irish Catholics, and towards this time of the first year, we realised there was a problem. We always had a bonfire (I don't remember guys) and fireworks, and would naturally invite our neighbours. But my parents, from East Sussex, were very much aware of the background, and some of the folk material at the nursery rhyme sort of level, which was apparently anti-catholic. Not that we had had this material passed onto us by oral tradition or anything, but my parents knew it. So they were in a quandary. To have a firework party and invite them was likely to be offensive. To have a party and not invite them would certainly be offensive. I think we were about to decide not to have a firework party when they came round and asked us to theirs.

It's much more complex over here than it seems.

There are still people around whose Protestantism is similar to that in NI - in the town where I live there is a memorial to local martyrs burned during the reign of Mary for denying transubstantiation. It was erected in the reign of Victoria, with a record of the names and their charges. It also included a passage from Revelations about the martyrs hanging around the throne of God asking him when he was going to get their murderers. Very unChristian, but practically eroded by local fumes, until someone decided to fund the recutting of all the text, a job which would have been better left undone, in the case of the Bible passage.

There are Catholics in the Bonfire societies in Sussex, and a recent book (Fire in the Streets?), celebrating the Lewes Bonfire, was actually written by a Catholic. The BBC Songs of Praise program, some years ago, interviewed various people in the town, and again, reference was made to Catholics being in the societies. I don't feel they can be being made to feel unwelcome. A recent attempt by Ian Paisley to raise support in the town was boycotted strongly. The Societies claim to be free of prejudice, and be more concerned with raising money for charities, and with making sure that authority doesn't shut them down. There is definitely a strong element of anti-authority about the bonfire, wherever it happens, and this was much more widespread in the last century. It was often local characters who had aroused offence who were burned in effigy. If you look at the websites (I only realised who was hosting some of them this year, last year when I bookmarked them, the name meant nothing) you will see what is claimed.

However, at least one of the societies makes a great deal of remembering the large number of Protestant martyrs at Lewes, and the coming of William of Orange, and it is hard to see how the tradition can be divorced from a counter Catholic position.

Two years ago, I heard the then bishop of Arundel (catholic) arguing on the radio that the East Sussex activities should be stopped. I'd never been to see what all the fuss was about - my mother had told me that her mother had insisted that it was not the place for a girl to be alone. And I thought I ought to see what the problem was, so I went down there. What I saw was a memorial to martyrs, a remembrance for the dead of the two world wars, and a carnival, with a lot of costumes, torches and firecrackers. I didn't see the firework displays. I went again last year, with a friend, and did see one of the displays. It didn't feel, in the main, any more than an enjoyable group activity. The only attempt at exclusion is the authorities' attempts to keep outsiders of all sorts out. And the rivalries between the societies. But I do have some caveats. Some parts do feel like the anonymous recutter of the forgotten memorial where I live. Otherwise, it is rather like the Up Helly Aa business in Orkney.

The martyrs part is tricky. The Pope has recently canonised the Catholic martyrs of the period. The many more Protestant dead, who died because they denied aspects of Catholic dogma, cannot be canonised, because the process does not exist. By formalising the Catholics status, the Protestants' position can be seen as having been diminished. Until then, all were equally victims of a cruel time. For the representatives of the diminishing group to call for the banning of the memorial activity for those diminished could be seen as inappropriate.

There was a discussion of the issue in the current issue of the BBC History Magazine, and the writer's conclusion was that Lewes has been lucky to get away with the balance it has achieved.

Outside the Bonfire areas, the issue of the origin of the 5th business is not really a live matter, as it is just an opportunity for fun, and the firework season is, at any rate, extending to draw in Diwali as well. It is complicated. And our friend the peasant may not be as sensitive to the background as he needs to be.

Mostly, it's an excuse for us to express what seems to be a worldwide delight in pyrotechnics, at a time of year which is much more sensible than July (early darkness). I wouldn't do a Guy Fawkes party elsewhere. Or go to one. Most displays in this country have no references to guys at all. If I was in the States, I'd go for the 4th. After all, that does celebrate the triumph of successful British republicans over the authorities, doesn't it?

Penny