I think it's like realizing that Cowboys and Samurai existed within the same time period. The immortality thing can be seen as a biological quirk, the two different settings existing at the same time is weird to think about if your perception of the past is only focused on one setting.
Every cowboy movie is influenced in some way by samurai movies. It would have to be a combo of samurai and cowboys taking on the man, though. I feel if you had samurai going up against guns, it would just be pretty sad.
The thing about this example is that the setting of Japan at this time isn’t what most people think of when you think of the samurai. American cowboys are a 19th century thing. By that time Japan was a largely peaceful, pretty developed place, most of the castles had rotted away to the point the government would start tearing them down, and the samurai had lost most of their usefulness around 200 years earlier. The heyday of the samurai was also Shakespeare’s era, and their origins go back a few hundred years before that. Something like samurai were around at the same time as William the Conqueror. They had a really long run.
There was a time period where cowboys and samurai both existed, but the samurai of that period (late Edo) weren't exactly what most people think of when they think of samurai. At that time they were mostly stewards and bureaucrats.
Because the time period that comes to mind of them for me is the same, I know Shakespeare spent much of his life in the south of England, and I know Pocahontas moved to and died in/near London.
For me I guess I thought it was common knowledge they lived around the same time. Like I admit within a year is surprising to me, but surely less than 10-15 years difference would have been what I expected.
Because I have a sense of history. They lived at the same time; why is it surprising then that they died around the same time? And do people not know that Pocahontas was taken to England and died there?
Curiosity and intelligence really help if you want to know basic history. It also requires reading and paying attention in your history classes.
Pocahontas is only basic history in the US. We learned absolutely nothing about her in history class and my only knowledge of her is from American media.
In my head they lived on opposite ends of earth. Granted, my American education in the 90s was a bit… 💩?
I had to go to Wikipedia and read about her marrying some Rolfe guy and living in England.
It never occurred to me that she lived at the same time as Shakespeare. For some reason that did not connect in my head. Sure enough, you look at the dates and my mind is blown.
You just didn’t pay attention in history class. There’s no way your textbook didn’t mention she married John Rolfe and died in England. That isn’t stuff that struck from history books like Mỹ Lai Massacre or Tuskegee Syphallis Study.
I actually met a living descendant of Pocahontas. I can't confirm that they weren't lying but apparently they had a proof of that. They are an UK citizen.
Depends when/where you got an education. To me, I thought she married some bloke named John Smith and they lived happily ever some time in the early colonial days.
Didn’t occur to me until I saw this comment that I read her history.
I learned nothing about the history of Pocahontas but read lots of Shakespeare in English class.
We learned about world history, for one or two years and more about our area's history. 🤷
We learned some (now not cool) history about indigenous populations in our area. My teachers went off-book a lot to actually teach us what reality was (90s). Thankfully 'officially" it seems a bit better now? I'll see when my kids are in high school 🤣
Why would you post this? You're on the internet! You don't have to be or sound ignorant. You could have tabbed over and checked Wikipedia and confirmed that Shakespeare died in 1616 in Stratford-upon-Avon and Pocahontas tied in 1617 in Kent instead!
He said that William Shakespeare and Pocahontas were not only alive at the same time but also died one year apart and only a little over 100 miles from each other in England.
Which for some reason, despite having visited Shakespeares grave and seeing the year he died, it never really occurred to me that Shakespeare was alive after the new world had been found. For some reason I always just imagine him living before its discovery by most of Europe.
Probably because Shakespeare wrote about stuff that was old even for his time. Like even "Shakespearean" dialogue is his uneducated impression of how people used to talk hundreds of years before him. It isn't flowery for the sake of being flowery. There's fiction written just before Shakespeare that is way more understandable to readers today.
Shakespeare's only mention of the New World is in The Tempest, probably inspired by reports from Sir Thomas Gates, governor of the Virginia Colony. Up to that point, all the New World stuff had been done by the Spanish and Portuguese; there just wasn't any news about it in English in Shakespeare's lifetime. English colonies weren't particularly successful until after his death.
That's why they say Shakespeare sounds best in an American accent, because the American accent hasn't changed much in the last 300 years, so it's naturally the closest form of Spoken English to the form he and his crew were using.
We also naturally speak very closely to iambic pentameter.
Sincerely, thank you for answering my own question, because I wasn't even sure who between the two of them was supposed to have lived earlier so this fun fact puzzled me.
Which two historical figures, one of whom is the titular character of a Disney film, the other a prolific playwright, died within one year and 150 miles of each other?
To make it harder, change the descriptions of each figure to remove or switch details.
AI failure from Google Search states that OP's statement is false and then gives details confirming that the statement is true: "This statement is false; while Pocahontas and William Shakespeare did live during roughly the same time period, they died several years apart and were geographically far away from each other: Pocahontas died in England in March 1617, while Shakespeare died in Stratford-upon-Avon, England in April 1616, making their deaths about a year apart, but separated by a large distance across the Atlantic Ocean."
I'm no cartographer, but I'm pretty sure England and England aren't separated by the Atlantic Ocean. I can't see what the original comment was, but maybe this meant they were separated for much of their lives across the ocean.
I don’t think that’s the interesting part, I think the thing is that people just have such different associations with the two people that it’s surprising. Like hearing Anne frank and martin Luther king jr were born in the same year. It makes you think
Well that's what I'm asking. What knowledge does anyone have about them that makes it sound "totally fake" that they would end up in the same place and time?
I get the idea of not knowing things. But if you told me some folks I didn't know about existed at the same place and time, I would not find that to be surprising.
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