Literary coincidences

[elettaria]

I listen to audiobooks while I sew, and tend to have two or more on the go at once. Right now I have Eco's The Name of the Rose for my Serious Reading, and am slowly making my way through Harry Potter for light relief. Last night I got through a few chapters of Eco, and after about an hour and a half of fairly heavy-duty 14th century church politics, including cults which were roaming about slaughtering Jews and burning witches, I decided to start Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It begins with Harry doing his homework, an essay entitled "Witch burning in the fourteenth century was completely pointless: discuss".

Any similar coincidences to report?

Comments

*pedant hat ON*

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

It begins with Harry doing his homework, an essay entitled "Witch burning in the fourteenth century was completely pointless: discuss".

Okay: in England, witchcraft did not become an offense separate from heresy until 1605, because James I had a bug up his butt about it, and in general the whole witch panic thing belongs to the Renaissance rather than the Middle Ages (during which people were far more worried about heretics). And even heresy wasn't something you could get burned at the stake for in England until 1401, which is when Henry IV enacted De haeretico comburendo, so that his hardcore commitment to ecclesiastical orthodoxy might make people less bothered about his dubious title to the crown. (It didn't work, but be that as it may.)

Which has nothing to do with literary coincidences, because I have no interesting ones to report that I can think of, but that has always annoyed the hell out of me. You fail at the Middle Ages, J.K. Rowling!

Re: *pedant hat ON*

[elettaria.livejournal.com]

(during which people were far more worried about heretics)

They really were, weren't they. Judging from Eco, who spends a lot more time droning on about this than I remembered, the order of priority was "heretics heretics heretics heretics massacre some Jews heretics heretics heretics heretics burn a witch heretics heretics HERETICS!"

I'm happily spotting some blindingly obvious plot holes and I've never exactly respected her as a plagiarist, so this doesn't surprise me. Did I mention that she's married to my ex-flatmate's ex-boyfriend? Ex-flatmate was a few years older than me.