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Mister Roboto posted:Pratchett has a daughter now, perhaps this was his way of exploring what it's like to imagine the rottenness of men your little girl will encounter as she grows up. When you say "now" you mean "has had a daughter since before he was writing Discworld books, right?" since she's about 34 and he's probably come to terms with her having crappy boyfriends by now.
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Aug 16, 2011 21:02
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thebardyspoon posted:When you say "now" you mean "has had a daughter since before he was writing Discworld books, right?" since she's about 34 and he's probably come to terms with her having crappy boyfriends by now. Perhaps this was his manner of drawing from that experience, since he started writing the Tiffany Aching books over 10 years ago. Mister Roboto fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Aug 16, 2011 |
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Aug 16, 2011 21:11
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I've always considered Tiffany and Susan to be spiritual sisters, in that they're both outsiders who are considerably smarter and more talented than those around them who have to find a way to find an identity while still living in the (often terrible) world. However, the lesson of Susan was to always be yourself so hard that the world around you had no choice but to bend to your will and personality, while the lesson of Tiffany was to know yourself so well that you could fit in around the cracks of the world as it was and still come out whole. I like Susan because she is unyielding, but I think Tiffany is a more realistic way of growing and thus a better subject for a YA series. But I still think Tiffany is just Susan with a few tweaks. And in that sense it makes sense that Esk would show up in this last book to sort of come full circle with his idea of outsider young women, since she was the first. Mister Roboto, I like your idea about the books playing out the various types of relationships with men that a girl might have she grows up though. I'd never thought of it that way, but you could be right. Then again I think about these types of things far too much. 
Sophia fucked around with this message at 21:34 on Aug 16, 2011 |
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Aug 16, 2011 21:31
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My problem with ISWM is that it starts building up to something that never really happens. That second chapter with the Rough Music is absolutely fantastic, but nothing else in the book ever really lives up to it. But anyone who tries to claim Pratchett is losing it is instantly disproven by Nation. I don't even understand how you can have that argument without somebody going "but Nation" and then the argument ends.
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Aug 17, 2011 07:57
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FactsAreUseless posted:My problem with ISWM is that it starts building up to something that never really happens. That second chapter with the Rough Music is absolutely fantastic, but nothing else in the book ever really lives up to it. I'd assume these people who are saying he's "losing it" are probably saying it started with UA and carried on with ISWM. Nation was 08 wasn't it? I loved ISWM and liked UA but the complaints started with UA.
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Aug 17, 2011 14:31
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I was thinking that maybe, just maybe Pratchett may be using up ALL of his ideas and ALL of the messages he wants to say before his time is up. Perhaps that's why the latter books have been a bit bloated in themes and characters. The man is an author, he has burning ideas and words that need release and need to be said, and if my hourglass was running out, I'd make sure they WERE said.
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Aug 17, 2011 15:13
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Sophia posted:I've always considered Tiffany and Susan to be spiritual sisters, in that they're both outsiders who are considerably smarter and more talented than those around them who have to find a way to find an identity while still living in the (often terrible) world. However, the lesson of Susan was to always be yourself so hard that the world around you had no choice but to bend to your will and personality, while the lesson of Tiffany was to know yourself so well that you could fit in around the cracks of the world as it was and still come out whole. 
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Aug 17, 2011 16:48
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ONE YEAR LATER posted:Doesn't Death show up and start playing his guitar because the music-with-rocks-in-it is the song of chaos that will destroy the disc? Not to nit-pick, but I'm going to pick the poo poo out of some nits. Death shows up and doesn't so much wail on his guitar as play some sort of nothingness-chord, the one that apparently the other notes need in the same way that other numbers need zero. The music goes apeshit because this is the chord that basically kills reality, and Death blackmails the music into releasing its grip on Buddy so he can play some... other music? Or something? And this drowns out the nothing-chord or cancels it or whatever. So basically he gambles the entire universe on getting Buddy to play something, which is totally in keeping with Death's whole "everything dies but everything is unique and thus each life is important" thing. That, or he was hoping to pick up some overtime.
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Aug 17, 2011 20:34
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I think Pratchett might be just somewhat burned out on Discworld, which is why UA and such were subpar (still good, just not Discworld good), and Nation was loving fantastic. I don't think Alzheimer's has anything to do with it.
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Aug 17, 2011 21:31
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DontMockMySmock posted:I think Pratchett might be just somewhat burned out on Discworld, which is why UA and such were subpar (still good, just not Discworld good), and Nation was loving fantastic. I don't think Alzheimer's has anything to do with it. So perhaps it's not a surprise that Nation, with a completely different setting, is his best in years.
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Aug 18, 2011 02:27
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I haven't read UA, because I assumed it would suck, because every single instance of the Wizards in the University is boring and unfunny. Does anybody actually enjoy the Wizards? I've spent a lot of time in academia, I just got a phd, I should be like the prime audience for the Wizards. I should check out ISWM.
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Aug 18, 2011 04:24
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modig posted:Does anybody actually enjoy the Wizards?
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Aug 18, 2011 04:28
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modig posted:Does anybody actually enjoy the Wizards? I like the bumbling old wizards and they are one of my favorite parts of Hogfather.I also prefered the wizards to the soccer story in UA. But they are very easy to overdose on. The weird supermarket plot in Reaper Man (an otherwise fantastic book) does get a bit long-winded. (Hut.)
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Aug 18, 2011 21:37
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The Last Continent had a ludicrous plot but for some reason I always found the wizard interactions leading up to discovering the island and figuring out what it was incredibly hilarious for some reason. I think I just really like Ridcully and what an unrepentant rear end in a top hat he is.
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Aug 18, 2011 21:48
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FactsAreUseless posted:Or at least burning out on his main plot/setting. The last five Discworld books (Going Postal, Thud, Making Money, Unseen Academicals, Snuff) have all been set in Ankh-Morpork. I Shall Wear Midnight also featured Ankh-Morpork heavily, despite the Aching series being (mostly) separate from the main books before. Before Going Postal was Monstrous Regiment, which featured Vimes, and then Night Watch. I get the feeling that Pratchett's trying to build up to some sort of Renaissance or close to and close out the main setting of the series, but I could easily see him burning out on it. Even though we could have a continuation/spinoff of the Witches series with Pastor Oats, and we get hints that something big could be happening in Uberwald with the re-emergence of remnants of the Evil Empire (which I like better as a distant and barely-mentioned idea, rather than an actual evil empire, which wouldn't fit the Discworld books at all), we're just finding out about it through more AM-centric books. Pratchett's writings have always been about dragging modern established ideas into a fantasy world. I always thought that with the Great Undertaking happening, he seems to be modernising Ankh Morpork in preparation for Vetinari's death (or perhaps his own). Once everything is finished, presumably Ankh Morpork and by extension, the Discworld series will be done. Besides, the man's been writing for almost 30 years. Not only has he, as a writer matured but your own personal tastes have changed as well. ps. Wizzards are awesome.
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Aug 18, 2011 22:04
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Kegslayer posted:Pratchett's writings have always been about dragging modern established ideas into a fantasy world. I always thought that with the Great Undertaking happening, he seems to be modernising Ankh Morpork in preparation for Vetinari's death (or perhaps his own). Once everything is finished, presumably Ankh Morpork and by extension, the Discworld series will be done.
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Aug 19, 2011 03:28
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There seems to be a whole range of opinions on this. I posted mine in this thread a while back, but my own experience is that Making Money was a great read, Unseen Academicals was pretty good (I didn't have any major problems with the plotting or the prose) and ISWM just fell down almost completely with grating, unpolished prose and plotting for like 80% of the book. I haven't read the leaked pages and don't really want to, but I do hope that if they are that rough, someone saved them in time. I really don't want the Watch to go out on a mechanically discordant note the way Tiffany did. edit: Also, I love the urban Victorian/industrial revolution books. If he and his helpers can finish Raising Taxes and do it justice, there's really nothing else I'd like as much to see before the end. JerryLee fucked around with this message at 09:22 on Aug 19, 2011 |
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Aug 19, 2011 09:19
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JerryLee posted:ISWM just fell down almost completely with grating, unpolished prose and plotting There's the kicker. Unpolished. People are quick to wonder if Terry's condition is the cause of the decline of the book quality, but what if it's actually the editors who aren't doing their jobs? Perhaps they are only human and feel bad for the man, and as such aren't able to be as, well, vicious with the cutting? Think about how hard it must be for his editors who have worked with him for 20 years. They once were able to have (kindhearted and well-meaning) disagreements over this word and that plot point and this clever pun. Now the poor man's slowly deteriorating; perhaps they just don't have the heart to tell their old friend "your ideas here aren't any good anymore." It'd just be too cruel.
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Aug 19, 2011 09:29
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Nevermind.
Jesto fucked around with this message at 06:39 on Sep 12, 2014 |
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Aug 19, 2011 12:37
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Jesto posted:Mr. Pump's dress, his 'competing' with Adora for Lipwig and developing a bit of a personality for character development. Completely abandoned. I agree with everything else but this was in Making Money and not Going Postal, Mr Pump is the parole officer and the golem that competes with Adora for Lipwig is the one they paint with a pink dress to clean the womens toilets in the post office, she becomes his secretary in MM and Terry does a Fatal Attraction parody. Something I read about the Adora smoking thing is that portraying someone as an unrepentant smoker who enjoys it is very difficult to justify to the people in charge of TV stuff. So you have to portray smoking as something you're driven too or as a bad habit you should drop as soon as possible. I'm with you in that I didn't enjoy most of Going Postal, Hogfather is probably the best. It's mostly Susan, Teatime and Death and they're all cast drat well and David Jason is ok as Albert instead of terrible as Rincewind. I don't think they cut out very much at all either which is strange since it's a longer book than Going Postal. thebardyspoon fucked around with this message at 12:55 on Aug 19, 2011 |
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Aug 19, 2011 12:47
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Nevermind.
Jesto fucked around with this message at 06:40 on Sep 12, 2014 |
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Aug 19, 2011 12:55
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Jesto posted:The actor who playe Vetinari looked absolutely nothing like him, lacking even the most prominent characteristics of Vetinari in the books, but that's permissable. He did a decent job with his role, so why should I care if he lacks black hair and a goatee? I have no idea why you didn't mention Reacher, either - that was the worst casting/scripting choice in the entire debacle. Xander77 fucked around with this message at 17:15 on Aug 19, 2011 |
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Aug 19, 2011 17:12
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Xander77 posted:I bagged on the movie and the casting in another thread (or this one?) but come on, Vetinari, Stanley and Groats were absolutely perfect. I remember wondering when it came out if Reacher Gilt in the book was a little too close to Rupert Murdock for some people's taste. So, with or without specific direction from management at Sky, they purposely changed the character so that nobody might think was meant to represent Murdock. This is not to say that Pratchett meant Gilt to represent Rupert Murdock specifically, but I think that he represents a certain kind of business figure, and Murdock falls into that category.
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Aug 19, 2011 18:53
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I'm not actually that familiar with Rupert Murdoc, but is he a one-eyed pirate? Because of he's not, the only thing that could remind people of him is the scheme - which can't be changed that much without destroying the plot.
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Aug 19, 2011 19:02
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Reacher Gilt seems more like a train company owner or something back in the days when they were starting up or an oil baron today, disregarding safety for profits and all that. The dude working with CMOT Dibbler in The Truth seems more like Murdoch and News International.
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Aug 19, 2011 19:07
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Reacher Gilt is Daniel Plainview, not Poirot. I was pretty annoyed about that but then I knew this was getting made by Sky and so it'd be beating you over the head with a stick saying Only Joking!!!! after every point made. And Charles Dance as Vetinari was perfect, what the hell is wrong with you people?
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Aug 19, 2011 19:44
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I was looking something else up, saw a name and thought, isn't that a street in Ankh-Morpork? The Dolly Sisters: 
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Aug 21, 2011 09:59
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Kerbtree posted:I was looking something else up, saw a name and thought, isn't that a street in Ankh-Morpork? Yes, we heard what happened up at Dolly Sisters and we're not happy about it either.
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Aug 21, 2011 10:09
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Iacen posted:I like the bumbling old wizards and they are one of my favorite parts of Hogfather.I also prefered the wizards to the soccer story in UA. Whatever one thinks of the "olde school" wizards, how in the world can one not enjoy Ponder Stibbons and the "new magic" plots/subplots? Also, the loving Bursar, man. The loving Bursar. And if you read all the books you realize that Ridcully is actually one of the most well-defined characters in the series in terms of backstory (spoilers) and personality. Really, who doesn't like the wizards? Even their titles are great. It's a pitch-perfect satire of British school systems.
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Aug 23, 2011 05:04
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precision posted:And if you read all the books you realize that Ridcully is actually one of the most well-defined characters in the series in terms of backstory (spoilers) and personality. Also, most people have never been to a British school, and it's not really a universal institution as a target for satire.
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Aug 23, 2011 07:33
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Xander77 posted:The guy who suddenly changed from a country squire to a city butcher's son over the course of one book? Most people in Britain have. I don't know where you're from, but it doesn't sound very important.
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Aug 23, 2011 08:46
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Xander77 posted:I bagged on the movie and the casting in another thread (or this one?) but come on, Vetinari, Stanley and Groats were absolutely perfect. Considering Reacher Gilt is suppose to be a more evil and matured version of Moist, they should have just had Richard Coyle in a fat suit with a parrot on his shoulder and an extremely fake wig and beard. The only retcon or change that I haven't liked so far was to the character of Drumknott. Most of the older books suggest that he's just as devious as Wonse was and probably just below Vetinari's level of intelligence but the newer ones seem to paint him as a clueless but efficient bureaucrat.
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Aug 23, 2011 09:44
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Kegslayer posted:The only retcon or change that I haven't liked so far was to the character of Drumknott. Most of the older books suggest that he's just as devious as Wonse was and probably just below Vetinari's level of intelligence but the newer ones seem to paint him as a clueless but efficient bureaucrat. Someone as devious as Wonse and nearly as smart as Vetinari would no doubt make an effort to appear clueless but efficient.
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Aug 23, 2011 10:45
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Kegslayer posted:The only retcon or change that I haven't liked so far was to the character of Drumknott. Most of the older books suggest that he's just as devious as Wonse was and probably just below Vetinari's level of intelligence but the newer ones seem to paint him as a clueless but efficient bureaucrat. Where does Drumknott appear that way? The first time Vimes and him have a serious conversation when Vetinari is poisoned suggests that Drumknott is a clean-cut rule-abiding type.
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Aug 23, 2011 12:51
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Xander77 posted:The guy who suddenly changed from a country squire to a city butcher's son over the course of one book? Clearly you haven't read all the books. Esme. quote:Also, most people have never been to a British school, and it's not really a universal institution as a target for satire. Terry Pratchett is British. Would you complain about all the specifically-British references in Monty Python? 
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Aug 23, 2011 15:24
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precision posted:Clearly you haven't read all the books. Esme. Yes, I would, and do.
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Aug 23, 2011 15:27
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So the film Animal House should be disregarded because not everyone lives in a country with frat houses? Ghostbusters underlying theme of bureaucratic interference in the name of "environmental protection" is irrelevant because at that time in history it was pretty much only Americans who were stick-up-rear end stubborn about it? Basically what I'm asking here is that any humor which is based on one cultural bugbear is unnecessary? I can't wrap my mind around that, at all, period, full stop, point blank.
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Aug 23, 2011 16:19
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precision posted:Terry Pratchett is British. Would you complain about all the specifically-British references in Monty Python?
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Aug 23, 2011 18:39
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precision posted:Terry Pratchett is British. Would you complain about all the specifically-British references in Monty Python? I have to say one of the only parts of any of Pratchett's books that is obviously and specifically British is the discussion of currency in Making Money. I don't see how any American is supposed to understand this: quote:'It's ruinous, sir, it really is. Y'see, it costs a ha'penny to make a farthin' an' nearly a penny to make a ha'penny. A penny comes in at a penny farthin'. Sixpences costs tuppence farthin', so we're in pocket there. Half a dollar costs seven pence. And it's only sixpence to make a dollar, a definite improvement, but that's 'cos we does 'em here. The real buggers are the mites, 'cos they're worth half a farthin' but cost sixpence 'cos it's fiddly work, their bein' so small and havin' that hole in the middle. The thruppenny bit, sir, we've only got a couple of people makin' those, a lot of work which runs out at seven pence. And don't ask me about the tuppenny piece!' The inefficiency of the mint is a central plot point. I think Pratchett would have done better just speaking in generic terms rather then throwing out a ton of very specific references that a huge chunk of his audience has no chance of understanding.
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Aug 23, 2011 19:15
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How British people reading his books do you guys think have dealt with a farthing? I suddenly curious about this.
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Aug 23, 2011 19:21
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