So randomly got to thinking about Les Miserables. Specifically about the fact that the historical event, during which it’s set, the (failed) June Revolution in Paris of 1832 is completely unknown nowadays.
Les Mis is still a huge cultural phenomenon (the fact you can use the two syllable abbreviation and people will know what you mean, even people like me who have no interest or knowledge of musical theatre, shows that). But no one outside a few french (or maybe socialist) history buffs has heard of the historical event is set in.
I hadn’t until I heard the Revolutions podcast, a history of revolutions by the guy who did History of Rome, and I consider myself a fairly knowledgeable person when it comes to history.
What other examples are there of historical events that have nowadays sunk in complete obscurity, with their memory only kept alive in the public imagination by very famous movie, book or play?
I’m looking for specific events not people or concepts (e.g. the British home guard during WW2, aka Dads Army, would not IMO as that’s more of a concept than an event). Also the work of art has to be very famous nowadays, I’m sure there are plenty of works about obscure events that were very famous but are now as obscure as the event they describe.
Maybe the Arab Revolt during WW1? Which is (outside the middle east at least) only remembered by the movie Laurence of Arabia?
Jussst maybe the battle of Agincourt? If that hadn’t had a Shakespeare play written about it, would it be anything more than an obscure late middle ages battle? The fact Crecy is also remembered as a famous battle speaks against that.
The death of Macbeth? Although that’s pushing the event not person rule. As the actual battle the real Macbeth died in, the Battle of Lumphanan does not feature in the play.
The bombing of Guernica, Spain in 1937. The death toll there would soon be overshadowed by far greater ones in World War II. (The Spanish Civil War itself has been overshadowed by World War II.)
But Pablo Picasso’s painting has kept the memory of the bombing alive.
Paul Revere’s (or anybody’s) ride preceding the shot heard ‘round the world would be almost entirely forgotten if not for Longfellow’s exaggerated and inaccurate poem more than 80 years later. A few of us would know that “various messengers from Boston alerted the militias”. But almost everybody would have to look up the specific names if indeed they cared.
The battle of Rourke’s Drift had no great importance (i.e. if it had been a British defeat, nothing material would have changed about the nature, scope and pace of British colonialism in South Africa) but lives on in the movie Zulu.
(Of course, the British did make a big deal of the battle at the time, hence it having enough lingering salience in 1964 to make a movie, because it gave them something to talk about that wasn’t the massive defeat at Isandlwana)
Everyone completely understands you so there is no reason to make the point I am making. Anyway, the event itself probably has to be of some reasonable significance, otherwise any depiction of a mundane event of the past would count as an obscure event made famous.
Like the VJ kiss or something like that - not what you meant really. EDIT: No, that’s a bad example by me, as that kiss was made famous. Let me think. Or someone else think for me?
Yes, really when you think of it, what determines whether or not a historical event becomes obscure is in the subsequent telling of it. And the event is probably not going to be told of in song and story unless there’s something compelling enough about it to merit the telling.
But I think there are some events that fit this thread, as in @Little_Nemo 's example of the bombing of Guernica. Only the Picasso painting saved it from obscurity; otherwise, as L_N said, it would have been overshadowed by the following events of WWII.
I doubt many people would have heard of a specific cavalry charge at the Battle of Balaclava during the Crimean War in 1854 if it weren’t for Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
Speaking of poems, the 701 B.C. Assyrian siege of Jerusalem is known today mainly through Lord Byron’s “The Destruction of Sennacherib” - and that poem was itself largely forgotten until an episode of Archer revealed that the character Pam Poovey has one of its stanzas tattooed on her back.
I was going to suggest this in the OP. An incredibly successful bit of propaganda by the British at the time, that persists to this day. They made a huge deal of the bravery of Rourkes Drift (a relatively minor engagement) in order to distract the public from the massive humiliating defeat they suffered at Isandlwana. Which should be far more well known battle, indigenous forces defeating a major European power in the era of breech loading rifles is pretty amazing.
But thanks to Zulu (and the fact the prequel about Isandlwana, Zulu Dawn was a flop) Rourkes Drift is the battle that is remembered.
Though as I understand it the mutiny itself was not particularly remarkable, it was the feat of Captain Bligh and his officers in successfully making their way back to the UK in a tiny boat, that was the remarkable part. And that is not covered in the movies.
I’d argue the fact they made five movies has more to do with the success of the earlier movies and the compelling nature of the story, than the significance of the historical event it’s based on.
