Remember, remember!
    The fifth of November,
    The Gunpowder treason and plot;
    I know of no reason
    Why the Gunpowder treason
    Should ever be forgot!
    Guy Fawkes and his companions
    Did the scheme contrive,
    To blow the King and Parliament
    All up alive.
    Threescore barrels, laid below,
    To prove old England's overthrow.
    But, by God's providence, him they catch,
    With a dark lantern, lighting a match!
    A stick and a stake
    For King James's sake!
    If you won't give me one,
    I'll take two,
    The better for me,
    And the worse for you.
    A rope, a rope, to hang the Pope,
    A penn'orth of cheese to choke him,
    A pint of beer to wash it down,
    And a jolly good fire to burn him.
    Holloa, boys! holloa, boys! make the bells ring!
    Holloa, boys! holloa boys! God save the King!
    Hip, hip, hooor-r-r-ray!
          When most people see this poem they think of V for Vendetta, a superhero comic book that had remarkable effects on revolution or social justice since being written. V for Vendetta takes place in old London during a revolution. This version of London has a fascist government that monitors and controls everybody. The main character, V, along with a girl he rescued, Evey, work towards recreating the Gunpowder treason in order to take down the government. V wears a mask with the face of Guy Fawkes on it as a tribute to the Gunpowder treason, as Guy Fawkes is his guide for how to make his revolution work. V for Vendetta is know for its tribute to past revolutions, but it has also served as a symbol in many revolutions that occurred after.
          The biggest inspiration for V for Vendetta was the Gunpowder treason. In the early 17th century James I had just taken over as king and, against what was expected, he was even more strict and severe than the previous king. With the new, more severe, laws in place  Robert Catesby knew he had to do something. So he organized a group consisting of  Robert Wintour, Christopher Wright, Thomas Percy, John Grant, Ambrose Rokewood, Robert Keyes, Sir Everard Digby, Francis Tresham, Guy Fawkes, Thomas Bates, and himself to help start  a revolution. Their plan was to fill a room under the house of parliament that they had rented with bombs and blow it up, but as the day got closer somebody tipped off members of the parliament saying " My lord, out of the love I bear to some of your friends, I have a care for your preservation. Therefore I would advise you, as you tender your life, to devise some excuse to shift of your attendance of this Parliament, for God and man hath concurred to punish the wickedness of this time" (Ford). Even though this revolution failed Guy Fawkes, the real mastermind behind the plot, became a symbol of revolution far and wide, including in V for Vendetta.
          In the book Guy Fawkes is huge symbol and inspiration for V. V used Fawkes as a guide as to how to plan his revolution, following his footsteps almost to a dot. He set out to find a large group of people and blow up the house of parliament, the only difference is he had the use of technology and he succeeded. In V for Vendetta  the face of Fawkes truly becomes a symbol for rebellions, it "signifies freedom of a distinctively left-libertarian sort" (Call). In the book V hacks into government TV channels and sends a message to the world that on the 5th of November the next year everybody should should wear a Guy Fawkes mask in order to storm the government. As the story progresses we see more and more people start to wear the mask in revolutionary acts. Soon the mask becomes a symbol in the book for the fight for freedom. This symbol ended up expanding beyond the book and into the real world through revolutions and protests.
         V for Vendetta was a revolutionary book, and later a revolutionary movie, in that it re-popularized the face of Guy Fawkes and the poem above. After the book was written there was a wave of Fawkes faces everywhere, "the face of Fawkes took over newsstands in Britain and the US during the '80s" (Call). He had become a legend again. Later the movie caused another wave of recognition, this time even higher,"it took over billboards, cinema screens and televisions in the early twenty-first century" (Call). Now most everybody can recognize the face as it has become a well known symbol of rebellion. The face of Fawkes has taken over peace rallies and many different demonstrations. A well known use of the Guy Fawkes mask now is even one of the biggest rebellion groups in the world today, Anonymous. Before V for Vendetta  was released only a few people knew the face of Guy Fawkes, but by writing this book and making it a movie Fawkes became a huge symbol, something V would be very proud of.
          In the book V for Vendetta the main character, V, uses an old revolution to plan his own, taking the face of Guy Fawkes to inspire people to join him. Little did the author know, when he wrote this, that the plot would extend beyond the book and change the world. Not only did V inspire the people in the fictional London n the book, but he also inspired people around the world today. Through his fight and speeches in to book V managed to inspire more than just the people in his London and spread the word all around, now its hard to come by somebody that cant recite the first few lines of the poem or identify the mask, if not as Guy Fawkes, as a symbol of rebellion. Thanks to the book and movie adaptation the Face of Guy Fawkes has spread around the world as a symbol of fighting for peace and revolution.