History ProphecyTwist / Literature

*** First, Cersei asked if she would marry the prince--meaning Rhaegar Targaryen, whom she fancied. She was told that she wouldn't marry the prince, but the ''king''. Cersei assumed that this meant that she would marry Rhaegar (the heir to the throne) after he succeeded as father as king. Instead, Rhaegar and his family were forced from power in a rebellion led by Robert Baratheon, and her father forced her into an [[AwfulWeddedLife utterly miserable]] arranged marriage with Robert after he took the throne.
*** Second, Cersei asked if she would become queen. She was told that she would, but that she would ultimately be usurped by a younger, more beautiful queen. Years after becoming queen, Cersei comes to believe that the usurper is Margaery Tyrell, a beautiful and very PR-savvy noblewoman who becomes queen after she marries Cersei's son Joffrey, leading Cersei to plot to bring her down. But she gives no thought to Sansa Stark (another highborn girl who's well on her way to seizing the throne herself with a little help from [[TheChessmaster Littlefinger]]) or Daenerys Targaryen (the heir to the deposed Targaryen dynasty, who's planning to take back her father's throne), both of whom have been praised for their beauty.
*** Third, Cersei asked if she and the king would have children. She was told that she would have three, but the king would have sixteen. She doesn't come to understand the meaning of this prophecy until winding up in a loveless marriage with Robert, who's a shameless womanizer: she sires three bastards in a secret affair with [[{{Twincest}} her twin brother Jaime]], while Robert sires sixteen bastards with various women across the Seven Kingdoms.
*** Maggy then caps off the prophecy by stating that a figure called "The ''Valonqar''" (High Valyrian for "little brother") will bring about her downfall, after she's lost everything. As a result, she's suspicious of her younger brother [[TheUnfavorite Tyrion]] (a dwarf) for ''years'', seizing every possible opportunity to subject him to emotional abuse. And when [[spoiler: Joffrey is assassinated]], she quickly jumps to the conclusion that Tyrion did it, and tries to have him executed. But her [[SelfFulfillingProphecy increasingly paranoid behavior]] gradually causes Jaime to drift away from her, culminating in him [[spoiler: rebelling against her to free Tyrion]], and later [[spoiler: declining to come to her aid when she is imprisoned for adultery]]. Too late, Cersei remembers that Jaime was born a few minutes after she was, technically making him her "little brother" too. [[OhCrap Whoops.]]\\\
''Literature/ADanceWithDragons'' twists the ''valonqar'' prophecy even further. After all of Cersei's paranoia over which one of her brothers will bring about her downfall, it's hinted that the prophecy may not even have referred to ''her'' "little brother". As it turns out, [[spoiler: Rhaegar Targaryen's son Prince Aegon (his second child) is [[NotQuiteDead still alive]]]], and [[spoiler: being groomed to retake the Iron Throne from Cersei]]. Note that [[spoiler: the Targaryens trace their lineage from Valyria]], so [[spoiler: the prophecy being in High Valyrian]] may have been a hint that [[spoiler: the ''valonqar'' was a Targaryen all along]]. To make it even more ambiguous: it's also hinted that ''valonqar'' might be a ''gender-neutral'' word meaning "younger sibling", opening up the possibility that it's ''Daenerys'' Targaryen (who's King Aerys' youngest surviving child, and is introduced as Viserys Targaryen's younger sibling).\\\

*** The main take-home from Cersei's experience is "[[StupidEvil don't commit property damage, bully, assault, demean and shortchange the prophet in order to get your fortune told]]". Because Cersei's acting like a prime RoyalBrat gave Maggy the Frog sufficient personal incentive to quite deliberately mess with the wording if she possibly could manage to.

--->'''Marwyn:''' Gorghan of Old Ghis once wrote that a prophecy is like a treacherous woman. She takes your member in her mouth, and you moan with the pleasure of it and think, how sweet, how fine, how good this is...and then her teeth snap shut and your moans turn to screams. That is the nature of prophecy, said Gorghan. Prophecy will bite your prick off every time.

** Melisandre should already know better -- she foresees that if Stannis marches against Kings Landing, his brother Renly will crush him, but if he attacks Storms End he'll defeat his brother. [[spoiler:Turns out both happen; at Storms End Stannis uses Melisandre's sorcery to kill his brother, forcing a large chunk of Renly's army to come over to his side. He then marches against Kings Landing, only to be crushed by a combined Lannister/Tyrell army led by 'Renly's ghost' (actually someone wearing Renly's armour in an ElCidPloy).]]

* In ''Literature/Shadow2010'', At her birth, a prophecy foretold that Queen Audrey would die before her sixteenth birthday. Audrey later dies in her sleep from poisoning, causing most to believe that the prophecy came true. [[spoiler: The twist is that Queen Audrey was actually a commoner stand-in named Devona, who had been Switched at Birth with the real Audrey (aka [[ReallyRoyaltyReveal Shadow]]) in order to protect her.]]

* The ''{{Literature/Aeneid}}'', unusually, has a prophecy that's much better than it sounds. Aeneas had heard the grim prophecy that he and his people wouldn't finish their wandering until they had grown so hungry that they gnawed on their tables. Much later, he makes landfall in Italy and his men eat a frugal picnic of wild fruit on wheat cakes, set on the grass. When the hungry men finish the fruit and start eating the wheat cakes, Aeneas's son jokes, "Are we so hungry that we're eating the tables?" And Aeneas remembers the prophecy, and realizes they've found their home.

*** In ''The Last Olympian'' we finally hear the entire prophecy which includes the lines: "The hero's soul, cursed blade shall reap. A single choice shall end his days. Olympus to preserve or raze.'' It turns out that [[spoiler: "hero" doesn't necessarily mean the person who turned 16. It was actually Luke, who had originally done a FaceHeelTurn, now going back to the good side, and forgiving the gods for all the bad they had done him.]]

*** Averted in ''The Son of Neptune''. [[spoiler: Octavian requests a prophecy from Mars before they send anyone to Alaska, as it is traditional, so [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments Mars grabs a piece of paper and basically writes "You will send people to Alaska" and tells them to get a move on]].]]

** In ''Literature/{{Jingo}}'', Nobby asks a fortune-teller about his romantic prospects, and she predicts he'll soon find himself sharing the intimate company of several attractive women. This technically comes true, as [[spoiler: he winds up disguised as a woman in a Klatchian city and engaging in "girl talk" with some local ladies]]. This gets {{Lampshaded}}; he was offered "the tenpenny future, that's what you see. Or there's the ten dollar future, that's what you get", and went for the 10p version.

* In Creator/JamesThurber's ''Literature/The13Clocks'', the duke is told his niece will be saved, and married, by a prince whose name does and does not begin with "X". In due course, [[spoiler:he learns of a prince whose assumed name begins with X and whose name does not]].

*** Part of the second great Prophecy includes the line: "And foes shall bear arms at the doors of death." In ''The House of Hades'' we learn that [[spoiler:foes does not refer to the Greeks and Romans, but our heroes teaming with a Giant and Titan]].

* In Creator/TeresaEdgerton's ''Literature/{{Celydonn}}'' series:
** At the beginning of ''Literature/TheMoonAndTheThorn'', a brief segment of backstory describes the effects of the wizard Glastyn's presence at major events--while he sometimes gave genuine prophecies, people tended to read too much into what he said (which once led to an unfortunate baby being given the name of the wizard's horse). One of his genuine prophecies led to Gwenlliant's mother giving her her name, which translates as "the White Flood"--the meaning of which is revealed later on in ''The Moon and the Thorn''.
** In ''Literature/TheMoonInHiding'', it is prophesied that Gwenlliant will be married three times. She goes through a marriage ceremony in ''Literature/TheCastleOfTheSilverWheel'' [[spoiler:when Tryffin rescues her from her would-be husband and marries her himself]]. Then in ''Literature/TheGrailAndTheRing'', [[spoiler:since they have been separated for a year under circumstances that legally dissolved their marriage, she and Tryffin remarry. It's pretty clear that when his term as Governor as Mochdreff is complete, Tryffin will arrange a proper royal wedding in his father's capital, thus completing the prophecy.]]

* In Creator/TerryPratchett's ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' books:

* In Robert Harris' "Pompeii"
** As Mt. Vesuvius begins to erupt, the book's Bad Guy hears a prophecy: "Two thousand years from now, long after the Roman Empire itself is gone, the city of Pompeii will be famous and people from all over the world will come to see it". This gives him the fatal wrong idea, i.e. that there was nothing to worry about the eruption, there would be no more than a bit of smoke and then life in Pompeii would go back to normal, and no need to panic and run away.

** In the novel "[[Literature/StarWarsMasterAndApprentice Master and Apprentice]]" Qui-Gon has a vision [[spoiler:of some sort of attack occurying at the coronation of Princess Fanry as Queen of Pijial. He assumes a terrorist group called the Blackguards will attack the ceremony and Princess Fanry. When the time comes the attack happens, but Fanry is leading the attack and is not a victim of it since she created the Blackguards to seize absolute power in the system. Qui-Gon later tells the Jedi Council after returning to Coruscant he was not only meant to have the vision but was also meant to misinterpert his vision. This leads him to realize that all the other prophecies he read about will come true sooner or later, including one about TheChosenOne, and also leads Qui-Gon to decline the seat on the Council that had been offered to him.]]

* Creator/JKRowling's ''Literature/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix''. Dumbledore explains that the part of the prophecy that states that "the Dark Lord shall mark him as his equal" means that it has to be Harry, because Voldemort heard of the prophecy and went to kill Harry, rather than Neville Longbottom, leaving Harry's scar as his "mark". Voldemort didn't hear the second half of the prophecy and thus never knew that [[TheChooserOfTheOne he chose Harry as his "equal" and the one capable of defeating him]].

* In the ''LightNovel/HaruhiSuzumiya'' novels, Kyon is told by a [[spoiler: Future-Mikuru]] what he will do in the next days. Most of the things are rather ridiculous, such as a prank call on Haruhi. When the moment arises, it all makes sense though.

** The three prophecies Maggy the Frog gave Cersei Lannister. All of them came (or is slowly becoming) true, but not like how Cersei thought.
*** Cersei asked if she will marry the prince. She was told that she won't marry the prince, but the king. At the time, the "prince" was Rhaegar Targaryen, the heir apparent to the Iron Throne, whom Cersei fancied. But the Targaryens were deposed before Rhaegar became king, Robert Baratheon became the new king afterwards, and Cersei was traded off by her father to marry him.
*** Cersei asked if she will become queen. She will, until a younger, more beautiful queen comes to topple her. Cersei indeed became queen, and thinks that the potential usurper is Margaery Tyrell, a beautiful and very PR-savvy noblewoman who becomes queen after she marries Joffrey, hence why she actively plots to bring her down. But Cersei gives no thoughts to Sansa Stark (another highborn girl who, although has fallen from grace, is slowly learning the game of thrones) or Daenerys Targaryen (who has already become queen across the Narrow Sea, and plans to take over the Seven Kingdoms in the near future), both of whom have been praised for their beauty.
*** Cersei asked if she and the king will have children. She will have three, the king will have sixteen. She didn't understand it at first, but it meant that they won't share children; she would sire three bastards with Jaime, while Robert would sire sixteen bastards with various women in the Seven Kingdoms.
*** Maggy then caps the prophecy by stating that a figure called "The ''Valonqar''" (High Valyrian for "little brother") will bring about her downfall, after she's lost everything. As a result, she's suspicious of her younger brother [[TheUnfavorite Tyrion]] (a dwarf) for ''years'', seizing every possible opportunity to subject him to emotional abuse. And when [[spoiler: her son Prince Joffrey is assassinated]], she quickly jumps to the conclusion that Tyrion did it, and tries to have him executed. But her [[SelfFulfillingProphecy increasingly paranoid behavior]] gradually causes her twin brother Jaime (who is also [[{{Twincest}} her lover]]) to drift away from her, culminating in him [[spoiler: rebelling against her to free Tyrion]], and later [[spoiler: declining to come to her aid when she is imprisoned for adultery]]. Too late, Cersei remembers that Jaime was born a few minutes after she was, technically making him her "little brother" too. [[OhCrap Whoops.]]\\\

* In Creator/MichaelCrichton's ''Literature/{{Sphere}}'', one of the characters notes that the spaceship from the future they're in lists the accident that brought it here as "unexplained". They believe that this means they won't be able to leave the ship and explain it; however, they survive and leave, but use the sphere's power to erase their memories of what happened.

** In the novel "[[Literature/StarWarsMasterAndApprentice Master and Apprentice]]" Qui-Gon has a vision [[spoiler:of some sort of attack occurying at the coronation of Princess Fanry as Queen of Pijial. He assumes a terrorist group called the Blackguards will attack the ceremony and Princess Fanry. When the time comes the attack happens, but Fanry is leading the attack and is not a victim of it since she created the Blackguards to seize absolute power in the system. Qui-Gon later tells the council he was not only meant to have the vision but was also meant to misinterpert his vision. This leads him to realize that all the other prophecies he read about will come true sooner or later, including one about TheChosenOne.]]