The French erotic novel The Story Of O, first published in 1953, opens with a preface that tells an allegedly true story. When a group of slaves on Barbados were freed, they pleaded with their master to take them back. When he refused, they slaughtered him and his family and resumed living in their old quarters, leading the same lives they did under slavery.

The press booklet for V for Vendetta doesn’t contain a biographical note about Alan Moore, the writer of the comic and the graphic novel the movie is based on. He’s mentioned in the publicists’ text, but only his artist-collaborator, David Lloyd, got into the bio section.

When The Who sang “Hope I die before I get old” back in 1966, it resonated with a generation that couldn’t conceive of their music, to them so new, being performed by anyone over the age of 30.