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Piracy in popular culture and fiction

Jack.jpgPirates area frequent topic in fiction and are associated with certain stereotypicalmanners of speaking and dress, some of them wholly fictional: "nearly allour notions of their behavior come from the golden age of fictional piracy,which reached its zenith in 1881 [sic] with the appearance of Robert LouisStevenson's Treasure Island." Someinventions of pirate culture such as "walking the plank" werepopularized by J. M. Barrie's novel, Peter Pan, where Captain Hook's pirateshelped define the fictional pirate archetype. Robert Newton's portrayal of LongJohn Silver in Disney's 1950 film adaptation of TreasureIsland also helped define the modern rendition of a pirate. Therecent Pirates of the Caribbean films havehelped kindle modern interest in piracy and have succeeded quite handsomely inbox office grosses. Due to modern piracy's status as basically robbery mixedwith violence, filmmakers do not commonly depict modern pirates in movies (withPiraty XX veka, Six Days Seven Nights, and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissoubeing rare exceptions).
 
  • The classicGilbert and Sullivan operetta The Pirates of Penzance focuses on The PirateKing and his hopeless band of pirates on the South coast of England. ThePirate King is often believed to be inspiration for Jack Sparrow.
  • RunningWild a long running Speed Metal/Power Metal act from Germany have utilized apiracy gimmick since the late 1980s, releasing albums and songs with names suchas "Under Jolly Roger", "Port Royal", "TreasureIsland", "Calico Jack", "Jennings' Revenge" (about thehugely successful 1715 pirate raid by Henry Jennings) and "Rogues enVogue".
  • "PirateMaster" is a CBS reality show which premiered on May 31, 2007."Pirate Master" is about a modern day pirate crew searching for losttreasure. The National Geographic Channel is airing a documentary about SamuelBellamy on January 7, 2008 called "Pirate Treasure Hunters." Thisfeatures footage of the exploration of the wreck of the Whydah Gally byexcavation expert Barry Clifford.
  • "LongJohn Silver" is portrayed as an anti-hero in the 2008 novel"SILVER--My Own Tale As Told By Me With A Goodly Amount Of Murder" byEdward Chupack.
  • Variousvariants on the pirate idea exist, notably "space pirates" in sciencefiction, such as the TV series "Firefly," that imagine future spaceshipping subject to similar pressures as shipping in the Age of Exploration.Pirates are also common mascots and names of sports teams.