Popular Misconceptions Caused by Famous Writing

Sometimes the truth, or an original story, gets lost overtime. Here are some popular misconceptions proliferated by works of fiction and retellings...

The Face that Launched a Thousand Ships

'The face that launch'd a thousand ships' is a well known phrase about the mythical Helen of Troy. Melenaus, King of Sparta, set out in search for the beautiful Helen who had fled from him with Paris, the Prince of Troy. In the myth this event turns into the Trojan War. Helen's legendary beauty indirectly leads to the war, hence the phrase. However the line comes directly from the 1592 Christopher Marlowe play, Doctor Faustus. In the Iliad (the origin of the story) Helen's 'face' launches 1,186 ships. Marlowe rounded the number down. To be fair his version is snappier to quote!

Jastrow / World History Encyclopedia

Vampires

The novel Dracula is based on mainly Balkan folklore of the vampire. However much of what we associate with vampires come from Bram Stoker's own inventions in the text: no reflections, fear of garlic, fear of crucifixes, and even transforming into a bat. His innovations to the vampire have shaped portrayals of them ever since.

Poor Richard III

The play Richard III by Shakespeare is a character assassination project. Shame Dick couldn't sue for defamation from his car park. Shakespeare is not the only one to create falsehoods about Richard III as even historical texts often perpetuate incorrect rumours from Tudor propaganda about him, especially about deformities he didn't have and murders he didn't commit.

Shakespeare took the rumour about Richard III murdering his nephews and ran with it. Can't say I particularly judge him for that as it is good drama and I suppose he has artistic license to use it. Yet, centuries later people conflate the famous play with history.

Shakespeare also wrote Richard III as a hunchback which wasn't true (...I do judge him for this one). It was common to portray evil characters as disabled or ugly because the stereotype was still a rampant belief in Tudor times. The whole play is misinformation central!

National Portrait Gallery

Literary Culture Shock

A more recent example of famous literature creating misconceptions comes from the Harry Potter book series. Specifically, for a very large amount of Americans and other unfamiliar countries, many concepts or words in the books that are culturally British are mistaken as a magical invention by JK Rowling.

The school house system is something many Americans don't (or at least didn't) realise is a common tradition in British Secondary Schools. Similarly, a Prefect, has been assumed to be an invention unique to Hogwarts like the Sorting Hat or the moving staircase. This is because the word sounds like it is derived from the word 'perfect' to describe the role (as Prefects are students with good behaviour that monitor other students). But Prefects are real! And are roles for students in schools in many countries, not just the UK.

Christmas crackers are a uniquely British item that Americans as well as readers from other countries understandably grouped as a magical when reading the Harry Potter books, because it does seem to fit the style of names for other Wizarding World novelties like 'fire whiskey' and 'fizzing whizzbees'.

Other examples in this entertaining thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/harrypotter/comments/11d7ysg/nonbritish_readers_whats_something_from_the_books/

Pandora Never Opened a Box

In Greek mythology Pandora was the first woman on Earth. She was given a 'box' by Zues, said to contain all the evil in the world. However Pandora did not have a box in the original myth but a large jar - known as a pythos or pithos. These were often used in Greece to store wine and sometimes to store remains for burial. It seems there may have been a mistranslation by Desiderius Erasmus, the 16th Century theologian and writer. He must have mixed up the word pythos with the Greek word for box or vessel, pyxis. Pandora's Box, as supposed to Pandora's Jar, has been perpetuated in every iteration of the myth since.