Discworld
Discworld is a fantasy comedy book series written by English author Terry Pratchett, set on the Discworld, a flat planet balanced on the backs of four elephants which in turn stand on the back of a giant turtle. The series began in 1983 with The Colour of Magic and continued until the final novel The Shepherd's Crown, which was published in 2015, following Pratchett's death. The books frequently parody or take inspiration from classic works, usually fantasy or science fiction, as well as mythology, folklore and fairy tales, and often use them for satirical parallels with cultural, political and scientific issues.
Forty-one Discworld novels were published. Apart from the first novel in the series, The Colour of Magic, the original British editions of the first 26 novels, up to Thief of Time, had cover art by Josh Kirby. After Kirby's death in 2001, the covers were designed by Paul Kidby. The American editions, published by HarperCollins, used their own cover art. Companion publications include eleven short stories, four popular science books, and a number of supplementary books and reference guides. The series has been adapted for graphic novels, theatre, computer and board games, and television.
Discworld books regularly topped Sunday Times best-sellers list, making Pratchett the UK's best-selling author in the 1990s. Discworld novels have also won awards such as the Prometheus Award and the Carnegie Medal. In the BBC's Big Read, four Discworld novels were in the top 100, and a total of fourteen in the top 200. More than 80 million Discworld books have been sold in 37 languages.
Composition
Very few of the Discworld novels have chapter divisions. Instead, they feature interweaving storylines. Pratchett was quoted as saying that he "just never got into the habit of chapters", later adding that "I have to shove them in the putative YA books because my editor screams until I do". However, the first Discworld novel The Colour of Magic was divided into "books", as is Pyramids. Additionally, Going Postal and Making Money both have chapters, a prologue, an epilogue, and brief teasers of what is to come in each chapter, in the style of A. A. Milne, Jules Verne, and Jerome K. Jerome.Themes and motifs
The Discworld novels contain common themes and motifs that run through the series. Many of the novels parody fantasy tropes and various subgenres of fantasy, like fairy tales or vampire tales. Analogies of real-world issues, such as religion, fundamentalism and inner city tension, business and politics, racial prejudice and exploitation recur, as do aspects of culture and entertainment such as opera, rock music, cinema, and football. Parodies of non-Discworld fiction also occur frequently, including Shakespeare, Beatrix Potter, and several movies. Major historical events, especially battles, are sometimes the basis for both trivial and key events, as are trends in science, technology, pop culture and modern art. There are also humanist themes in many Discworld novels, and a focus on critical thinking skills in the Witches and Tiffany Aching series.Storylines
The Discworld novels and stories are, in principle, stand-alone works. However, a number of novels and stories form novel sequences with distinct story arcs:Rincewind
was the first protagonist of Discworld. He is a wizard with no skill, no wizardly qualifications, and no interest in heroics. He is extremely cowardly but is constantly thrust into dangerous adventures. He saves Discworld on several occasions, and has an instrumental role in the emergence of life on Roundworld.Other characters in the Rincewind story arc include Cohen the Barbarian, an aging hero of the old fantasy tradition, out of touch with the modern world and still fighting despite his advanced age; Twoflower, a naive tourist from the Agatean Empire ; and The Luggage, a magical, semi-sentient and aggressive multi-legged travelling accessory. Rincewind appears in eight Discworld novels as well as the four Science of Discworld supplementary books.
Death
, a seven-foot skeleton in a black robe who rides a pale horse named Binky, appears in every novel except The Wee Free Men and Snuff, although sometimes with only a few lines. His dialogue is always depicted in SMALL CAPS without quotation marks. Several characters have said that his voice seemed to reach their minds without making a sound.Death guides souls from this world to the next. Over millennia he has developed a fascination with humanity to a point and feels protective of it. He adopted a human daughter and took on a human apprentice. Eventually the daughter and apprentice had a daughter, Susan Sto Helit, a primary character in Soul Music, Hogfather, and Thief of Time.
Characters that often appear with Death include his butler Albert, his granddaughter Susan Sto Helit, the Death of Rats in charge of gathering the souls of rodents, Quoth the raven, and the Auditors of Reality, the closest thing Death has to a nemesis.
Five Discworld novels feature prominently either Death or Susan with Death appearing. He also appears in the short stories Death and What Comes Next, Theatre of Cruelty and Turntables of the Night.
Witches
in Pratchett's universe act as herbalists, nurses, adjudicators and wise women who can use magic but generally prefer not to, finding simple but cunningly applied psychology far more effective.The principal witch, Granny Weatherwax, a taciturn, bitter old crone from the small mountain country of Lancre, largely despises people but acts as their healer and protector because no one else can do this as well as she can. Her closest friend is Nanny Ogg, a jolly, personable witch with the "common touch" who enjoys a smoke and a pint of beer, and often sings bawdy folk songs like the notorious "Hedgehog Song". The two take on apprentice witches: first Magrat Garlick, then Agnes Nitt, then Tiffany Aching, who become accomplished witches.
Other characters in the Witches series include:
- King Verence II of Lancre, a onetime Fool
- Jason Ogg, Nanny Ogg's eldest son, the local blacksmith
- Shawn Ogg, Nanny's youngest son who serves as his country's entire army and civil service
- Nanny's murderous cat Greebo.
City Watch
The stories featuring the Ankh-Morpork City Watch are urban fantasy, and frequently depict a traditional, magically run fantasy world coming into contact with modern technology. They revolve around the growth of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch from a hopeless gang of three to a fully-equipped and efficient police force. The stories are largely police procedurals, featuring crimes with heavy political or societal overtones.The main character Sam Vimes is a haggard, cynical, working-class street copper. When introduced in Guards! Guards!, he is the alcoholic captain of the three-person Night Watch, which also includes the lazy, cowardly, and none-too-bright sergeant Fred Colon and Corporal Nobby Nobbs, a petty thief in his own right. Then Carrot Ironfoundersson, a 6-foot-6-inch-tall dwarf-by-adoption, joins the Watch.
Other main characters include
- Angua, a werewolf,
- Detritus, a troll,
- Reg Shoe, a zombie and Dead Rights campaigner,
- Cuddy, a Dwarf in Men at Arms, and
- Golem Constable Dorfl.
The City Watch feature in eight Discworld stories, and cameoed in a number of others, including Making Money, the children's book Where's My Cow?, and the short story "Theatre of Cruelty".
Pratchett stated on numerous occasions that the presence of the City Watch makes Ankh-Morpork stories "problematic", as stories set in the city that do not directly involve Vimes and the Watch often require a Watch presence to maintain the story—at which point, it becomes a Watch story by default.
Wizards
The Wizards of Unseen University appear prominently throughout many Discworld novels; the books that centre around them exclusively are The Science of the Discworld series and the novels Unseen Academicals and The Last Continent. In the early books, the faculty of UU changed frequently; promotion usually involved assassination. However, after the ascension of the bombastic Mustrum Ridcully to the position of Archchancellor, the hierarchy settled down and characters had the chance to develop. Earlier books featured the wizards in possible invasions of Discworld by creatures from the Dungeon Dimensions, Lovecraftian monsters that hungered for magic.The wizards of UU employ the traditional "whizz-bang" type of magic seen in Dungeons & Dragons games, but also investigate the rules and structure of magic in terms highly reminiscent of particle physics.
Prominent members include
- Ponder Stibbons, a geeky young wizard,
- Hex, the Disc's first computer/semi-sentient thinking engine,
- the Librarian, turned into an orangutan by magical accident, who refuses to be turned back,
- the Dean,
- the mentally unstable Bursar,
- the Chair of Indefinite Studies,
- the Lecturer in Recent Runes, and
- the Senior Wrangler.
The Wizards feature prominently in nine Discworld books and star in The Science of Discworld series and the short story "A Collegiate Casting-Out of Devilish Devices".