Discworld

#Pratchat7A – The Curious Incident of the Dragon and the Night Watch

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In this, the next episode after our seventh one, writer, performer and librarian Aimee Nichols talks with us about the ninth-but-one Discworld novel, Terry Pratchett’s Guards! Guards! Published in 1989, it kicks off the longest-running and arguably most popular Discworld sequence: the adventures of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch.

The Night Watch has seen better days: the Thieves’ Guild has made them all but obsolete, and with the recent death of Herbert Gaskin, their company has dwindled to just three: career Sergeant Fred Colon, former street urchin Corporal Nobbs, and perpetually drunk Captain Samuel Vimes. They’re shaken up by new recruit Carrot – a human raised (as far as possible) by dwarfs – who not only volunteered to join, but actually tries to uphold the law. But they’ll need all the help they can get as a secret cabal of resentful men are manipulated by a charismatic leader for an incredible purpose: to bring a dragon to Ankh-Morpork…

Vimes, Colon, Nobby and Carrot all make their debuts here, as do Lady Sybil Ramkin (in her biggest role), Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler, Detritus the troll and the concept of L-Space, and both the Librarian and the Patrician feature prominently. It’s also the first Discworld novel set entirely in Ankh-Morpork, though after appearances in all of the previous novels it already feels like home. Even nearly 30 years later, Guards! Guards! feels incredibly relevant and funny, but it’s also weird to go back to Sam Vimes’ beginning when he still has so much evolution and redemption ahead of him. (If you’d like to head straight to his next book, just go back in time to Pratchat#1, “Boots Theory“, when we read Men at Arms with Cal Wilson.)

We’d love to hear what you thought of Guards! Guards! – use the hashtag #Pratchat7A on social media to join the conversation! (If you use the…er…other number we’ll probably find you too.)

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Guest Aimee Nichols is not only a librarian, but also a writer and performer. You can follow her (and by proxy, her dog Winston) on Twitter at @wordsandsequins, or check our her web site at aimee-nichols.com. You can also find Aimee’s wonderful piece about the passing of Sir Terry on Medium.

It’s time to step out of the Discworld again when we return from L-Space next month, when author Amie Kaufman will join us to talk about the first book of the Nomes: Truckers. As usual, if you want us to answer your questions on the podcast, get them in as soon as you can! Ask them via social media using the hashtag #Pratchat9.

You’ll find the full notes and errata for this episode on our web site.

Want to help us get to the end of our six(ish) year mission and read every Pratchett book – and more? You can support us with a tip, or a subscription for as little as $2 a month, and that’s cuttin’ our own throats! See our Support Us page for details.

#Pratchat7 Notes and Errata

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Theses are the show notes and errata for episode 7, “All the Fingle Ladies“, featuring guest Georgina Chadderton, discussing the 1990 illustrated Discworld novel Eric.

Iconographic Evidence

Here’s George’s illustration of Angua and Gaspode, from her Instagram:

Notes and Errata

  • The episode title – and the quip in the episode that inspired it – are a play on Beyoncé’s massive pop R&B hit single “Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)” from 2008. The music video was also a massive hit, with a dance routine inspired by the work of famous Hollywood choreographer Bob Fosse, and the entire thing filmed in a single take in black and white.
  • In case you’ve somehow been hiding under a pop culture rock, 2 Faust 2 Furious is a reference to the sequel to car/heist/action film The Fast and the Furious, which was titled 2 Fast 2 Furious. There are now eight films in this franchise which features Vin Diesel (in every film except 2 Fast 2 Furious), Michelle Rodriguez, Dwayne Johnson, Kurt Russell and Jason Statham. The only other one with a punny name is the eighth, titled The Fate of the Furious.
  • George’s 24-hour comics are produced as part of 24-Hour Comics Day, an annual event in which comic creators are challenged to create a 24-page comic in a single day. 24-Hour Comics Day has run in some form every year since 2004, when it was originally organised by publisher Nat Gertler, and one of its most famous proponents (and long-time participants) is Scott McCloud, the creator of Understanding Comics.
  • “Time is a flat circle“, now the subject of many memes, is derived from a scene in the first season of True Detective. It refers to the theory of “eternal return”, which states that existence repeats itself over and over in very similar ways. Ben’s favourite iteration of this from fiction is the Time Prophet, a character from the weird Canadian-German sci-fi series Lexx, who could see into past cycles of time (“not very clearly mind you”) to predict the future of the current cycle.
  • You can see George’s image of Angua and Gaspode (inspired by our Men At Arms episode) at the top of this page, and also on her Instagram. Her versions of Tiffany Aching, Rincewind and the Luggage are on the Fan Art page of her web site.
  • Bees are an essential part of the pollination cycle for a great many food crops. “Colony collapse disorder” (CCD) is when a majority of a worker bee population abandon their hive, leading to the collapse of the rest of the colony. It has become a serious problem over the last decade, especially in the United States, though the causes are not well-identified; everything from pesticides to climate change and modern commercial beekeeping practices have been suggested.
  • The two previous times Rincewind found himself suddenly able to wield magic were in Sourcery! (see episode three) and The Light Fantastic.
  • We didn’t spot this at the time of recording, but that joke in the first footnote about a feather being erotic and a chicken being kinky is not a Pratchett original. Whether it’s an oldie that’s done the rounds multiple times or not we can’t be sure, but we’ve found at least one earlier usage: the 1982 special Christmas episode of The Kenny Everett Television Show. Kenny Everett’s second TV series included many solo sketches featuring various recurring characters, and in this episode Everett tells the feather vs chicken joke (in pretty much the same way as Pratchett) as philosophical punk Gizzard Puke. You can find this episode on YouTube – we’ve linked to the time index of the joke section, at around 3m44s.
  • The character of Faust or Faustus was based on real-life 16th century German astrologer and alchemist Johann Georg Faust, who had many misadventures and was the subject of many rumours regarding his supposed magical powers. He died (possibly in an alchemical explosion) leaving a mutilated corpse – evidence, according to his enemies, that the Devil had come to collect him personally. The tale of his “deal with the devil” – selling his soul via the demon Mephistopheles, in exchange for almost unlimited magical power, mostly because he was bored – became a popular German legend, with the two most famous adaptations being for the theatre: Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus in 1604, and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s more snappily titled Faust in 1808. In both versions Faust interacts with Helen of Troy.
  • The Tenth Doctor is prevented from regenerating and prematurely aged about 1,000 years by the Master in the episode Last of the Time Lords, causing him to shrink and lose all his hair. Many fans compared the tiny CGI Doctor (who even had a tiny version of the Tenth Doctor’s brown suit, though why was not explained) to Dobby the house-elf, as seen in the Harry Potter films.
  • Adrian Mole is the protagonist in a series of comedy novels by Sue Townsend. The first two – The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13¾ and The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole – were written largely for teenagers, depicting the trials of an adolescent during the Thatcher years in Britain. They have been adapted for radio, stage and most famously television, and even as a stage musical! Several later books, less well-known outside of the UK, followed Adrian into adulthood and middle age.
  • The Road to El Dorado (2000) is a DreamWorks animated film about two 16th century Spanish con artists who head to the New World with Cortés and find El Dorado, the mythical City of Gold, where they pretend to be gods. It stars the voices of Kevin Kline, Kenneth Branagh, Rosie Perez, Armande Assante and Edward James Olmos.
  • In the 1975 comedy film Monty Python and the Holy Grail, one of King Arthur’s knights, Sir Robin (played by Eric Idle), is accompanied by minstrels (led by Neil Innes) whose songs about Robin’s bravery include grisly details of things that supposedly don’t scare him. He abruptly tells them to stop singing before things get too awful.
  • “Goetia” is a form of ritual magic involving the conjuration of demons, most famously drawn from the 17th-century grimoire (or book of magic) The Lesser Key of Solomon, which lists 72 demons that may be summoned in a section titled “Ars Goetia“. These entities – supposedly summoned by King Solomon himself – are often referred to as “goetic demons”, and their names have been frequently used in pop culture for all manner of demonic and evil entities. As well as prompting the name of Vassenago in this book, Vassago – the third demon, and a Prince of Hell – has also been referenced in comic books, videogames and novels.
  • Gachnar, the Dark Lord of Nightmares and the Bringer of Terror (according to him), appears in the fourth season Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode Fear, Itself. (Ben’s synopsis is mostly correct.)
  • The scene Liz refers to is from Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, when Ace forces his way out of the rear end of a rubbery mechanical rhino after the fan and hatch both malfunction. In the first Police Academy film, officious Lieutenant Harris crashes a motorcycle and flies into the back of an open horse float, where it is implied (but not shown) that he gets his head…er…stuck. 1995 and 1984 sure were different times for film, huh.
  • Miffy is the English name of Nijntje, the young female rabbit protagonist of a series of books created in 1955 by Dutch artist Dick Bruna. There are 26 books in the series, most published since 1990, though Bruna retired in 2014 and died in 2017. The stories are hugely popular and have been adapted into two television series and a feature film, and heavily merchandised. Miffy and the other rabbit characters are drawn with an “X” to represent her nose, and no mouth; given Liz’s childhood terror, we’d like to suggest listener discretion when viewing the official Miffy web site.
  • Target’s Doctor Who novelisations – short books adapting the television stories into prose – are famous both for helping many Who fans get into reading, and also for being the only way fans could revisit earlier stories before they were released on home video – or indeed at all, in the case of the stories which have been lost. Sadly the site “On Target” which was devoted to these books has also been lost.
  • South Australians are notable for sounding significantly more English than folks from other Australian states. This is largely due to their use of a small number of significant alternate vowel sounds and is usually attributed to the fact that the colony of South Australia was established mostly by free settlers, rather than convicts, or that there were far fewer Irish settlers there. Not everyone agrees with that theory.
  • The time travel episode of Stargate SG-1 to which Ben refers is the penultimate episode of season two, titled 1969.
  • Be Kind Rewind is a 2008 Michel Gondry comedy in which Mos Def plays a video store clerk whose friend (Jack Black) accidentally erases all the tapes in the store. In desperation to keep the store going, they replace the tapes with their own extremely low-budget, inadvertently hilarious recreations of popular films like Ghostbusters and Driving Miss Daisy, which become very popular.
  • “Bricky” and “sparky” are Australian slang for, respectively, bricklayers and electricians. (“Chippie” is slang for a carpenter.)
  • The Seinfeld episode where Elaine has an argument about exclamation points is The Sniffing Accountant, from season five.
  • The cartoon George refers to near the end is The Baskervilles, a kind of “reverse Munsters” in which the very normal and nice Baskerville family try to fit into the Hellish cityscape of “Underworld: The Theme Park”. The Baskervilles’ neighbours include the Lucifers, the Frankensteins and the Draculas, plus the park’s boss, “The Boss” (who may or may not be the actual Devil) and his right-hand man, a skeleton with an Australian accent named Kevin. A British, French and Canadian co-production, The Baskervilles ran for one season in 2000 and included Rob Brydon of The Trip fame in the cast! You can find at least the first episode on YouTube.
  • Ben couldn’t find the cartoon that features the Prince of Heck (he certainly wasn’t thinking of Dilbert, which is what the Internet turns up), but “HIM” (not “that guy”) is the flamboyant prince of darkness who cannot be named from the original ’98-’05 run of The Powerpuff Girls. HIM appears as a traditional devil figure, but in drag with lobster claws for hands, and is extremely powerful; he is the Girls’ second greatest foe and the one they fear the most.
  • The Tenacious D song Liz refers to is “Tribute”, the D’s first and biggest hit; you can find the music video here.
  • You can find fellow Discworld podcast Radio Morpork at radiomorpork.wordpress.com. They’ve recently released their twenty-second episode, bringing them up to The Last Continent.
  • Odysseus does many things which by today’s standards are horrendous, including slaughtering the suitors who wanted to marry his wife during his absence as well as the servants who had waited on them, but there are few if any writings about his life afterwards (or his death).
  • Ben’s bank heist game, which ran from early 2016 to early 2017, was Small Time Criminals.

 

#Pratchat7 – All the Fingle Ladies

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In episode seven, comic book creator and illustrator Georgina Chadderton, aka George Rex, joins us to discuss Terry Pratchett’s ninth Discworld novel: Faust Eric! Published in 1990 – alongside four other novels, making it one of Pterry’s most prolific years – it’s a shorter novel, originally published in a large format with lavish illustrations by Discworld cover artist Josh Kirby. (Also, fair warning to the pun-averse: Elizabeth really goes to town in this one…)

Eric Thurslow is surprised to find that the demon he has summoned looks suspiciously like a wizard – but not as surprised as the inept “wizzard” Rincewind is to be summoned. Freed from the Dungeon Dimensions, he finds himself compelled to grant wishes to an adolescent demonologist – and to his even greater surprise, he’s able to do it! Meanwhile, following him across space, time and dimensions, Rincewind’s faithful Luggage is catching up to its master – and just as well, because the Prince of Hell isn’t too pleased that his plans for Eric have gone awry… 

Eric is the fourth book to feature Rincewind – last seen in Sourcery – and like his previous appearances it’s a romp across the Discworld to places (and times) previously unseen. Sometimes regarded as a bit of an addendum to the main Discworld series because of its short length, Eric wears its parody – and its classical allusions – proudly on its sleeve. Did you like Eric? Did you read an edition with the illustrations? We’d love to hear from you! Use the hashtag #Pratchat7 on social media to join the conversation.

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Guest Georgina Chadderton (aka George Rex) is a comic book creator and illustrator based in Adelaide. You can find her delightful autobiographical comics online at georgerexcomics.com, and at @georgerexcomics on Instagram. George was in Melbourne for a residency with 100 Story Building, where Ben works facilitating creative writing workshops for young people. George’s Etsy shop is full of cool comics, postcards, badges and prints.

We skipped ahead to make sure we could chat with Georgina while she was in Melbourne, so we’re going back a step for our June episode, where librarian Aimee Nichols will join us to talk about the very first City Watch book: Guards! Guards! We’ll be recording soon, so if you’d like us to respond to you on the podcast, get in quick! Ask your questions via social media using the hashtag #Pratchat7A. (What, you expected us to actually use the forbidden number?)

You’ll find the full notes and errata for this episode on our web site.

Want to help us get to the end of our six(ish) year mission and read every Pratchett book – and more? You can support us with a tip, or a subscription for as little as $2 a month, and that’s cuttin’ our own throats! See our Support Us page for details.

#Pratchat5 Notes and Errata

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Theses are the notes and errata for episode 5, “Ten Points to Viper House” featuring guest Richard McKenzie, discussing the 1989 Discworld novel Pyramids.

  • Ben and Richard both have Corgi paperbacks of Pyramids with the same Josh Kirby cover and ISBN – but Richard’s is a later (not older, as Ben says) printing which unusually has more pages. Ben’s is a 1992 printing with 285 pages, while Richard’s is from 1997 and has 380! …we realise this is probably not interesting to anyone except extreme bibliophiles, but it caused Ben some trouble when trying to track his reading progress on Goodreads.
  • The four books within Pyramids start off referring to the famous ancient Egyptian text The Book of the Dead, a collection of spells and other information meant to help guide the dead through the afterlife. Its full title has been translated as both The Book of Going Forth by Day and The Book of Emerging Forth into the Light. Other ancient Egyptian funerary texts include the Book of Traversing Eternity, the Enigmatic Book of the Netherworld, The Contendings of Horus and Seth, and the Book of the Heavenly Cow.
  • Assassin’s Creed is one of the most successful videogame franchises of recent memory; the assassins of the title are both elite killers for hire, and also engaged in an ancient war over the fate of the world against the Knights Templar, and each game takes place in a different location and era of history. The most recent one (as of this episode), Assassin’s Creed Origins, explores the founding of the assassin’s order – and is set around 50 BC in Egypt! Though as far as we know, you don’t get to kill any pyramids. (The game does, however, contain many easter eggs – including a monument shaped like the TARDIS – so if you play it, keep an eye out for Djelibeybi references!)
  • For a series of books intended for kids, an awful lot of people die in Harry Potter. According to one count, there are 76 individual deaths described across the seven books, but way more people die than that – there are at least fifty casualties in the Battle of Hogwarts alone!
  • In Game of Thrones, Dany’s full name and title is: “Daenerys of the House Targaryen, the First of Her Name, Queen of Meereen, Queen of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lady Regnant of the Seven Kingdoms, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, Mhysa, Breaker of Chains, the Unburnt, Mother of Dragons”. This is five words shorter than Teppic’s full title in Pyramids, which is written out in full eleven times.
  • Camel humps are deposits of fatty tissue; it can be metabolised back into water. Some camels can go without drinking water for as long as ten days.
  • The word “quantum“, which becomes a synonym on the Discworld for things which are too complicated or weird to make sense, is used in science to refer the smallest possible unit or portion of various things, for example “packets” of photons emitted in electromagnetic radiation.
  • In fan favourite sci-fi series Firefly and its sequel movie Serenity, one of the major characters is Inara, a registered “Companion”, a role similar to a courtesan with very high social status. Their training includes languages, psychology, unarmed combat, archery and much more; they begin their training at the Companion’s Guild at the age of twelve, so they possibly have more in common with assassins than they do handmaidens!
  • The Grease Megamix is a mashup of three songs from the 1978 movie version of the 1971 musical Grease, set in the 1950s. It was released as a single in 1990 to promote the film being made available on video. The song was a number one hit in Australia in 1991, in part due to Olivia Newton-John’s prominent role. It’s a killer to dance and sing along to if you know the words.
  • The theory that computers could have become self-aware beings without us knowing has been around for a while; the aeon article “Consciousness creep” by George Musser is a good primer.
  • There are many rankings of Discworld books that put Pyramids near the top, including fellow Discworld podcast Radio Morpork, who currently have it at number four, and a Buzzfeed list from 2015 which placed it at number three (but we’re not linking to it, because the author discounted anything Pratchett wrote after his Alzheimer’s diagnosis in 2007 as “unrecognisable”, a stance this podcast considers offensive and ridiculous).
  • There is no scientific evidence for “pyramid power“, which rose to prominence in the 1970s. Proponents claim pyramids can do anything from stirring sexual urges to sharpening razors to providing unlimited free energy. It’s still popular in some circles.
  • Autolycus was a demi-god whose father was Hermes; he taught Hercules to wrestle, and his grandchildren include Odysseus and Jason of the Argonauts. A version of him features prominently as a recurring character in the 1990s series Hercules: the Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess, portrayed by Bruce Campbell as a Robin Hood-like prince of thieves.
  • David Carradine starred in the 1970s TV series Kung Fu as Kwai Chang Caine, a half-Chinese Shaolin monk who “walked the Earth” in the American west looking for his brother and helping the downtrodden with his skills in martial arts. You probably know who Lassie is; The Littlest Hobo was a similarly talented dog, who also “walked the Earth” helping those he encountered on his travels.
  • Dave Greenslade is definitely not dead, and Ben and Liz would like to stress that they enjoyed his rendition of A Wizard’s Staff Has a Knob on the End. For The Hedgehog Can Never Be Buggered at All, check out the collection of fan-written lyrics at the L-Space web (though be aware that most of them are very…well, they’re the kind of thing Nanny Ogg would sing when she’s drunk).
  • According to the most prominent timeline, Pyramids is set a few years after the events of Sourcery, and about ten years before Guards! Guards!. This also places it during the fifteen years Lancre skips over in Wyrd Sisters. Feel free to let us know if you have a different theory!
  • Occam’s Razor is a philosophical principle usually applied in scientific thought, which basically says that an explanation that doesn’t require the invention of new things is more likely to be true.
  • Richard’s list of Assassin’s Guild subjects was sourced from The Assassin’s Guild Yearbook and Diary released in 2000. Like the other Discworld-themed diaries it had only a single print run, and is one of the harder books to find. (Update: much of this material is being reprinted in the Ankh-Morpork Archives! Volume One, published in late 2019, includes the Assassin’s Guild material.)
  • Ben’s camel’s name is, of course, spelled “Ptypical”. (Thanks to listener Brendan for pointing this out.)

Thanks for reading the show notes! Do let us know if we’ve made any mistakes, or if you have questions.

#Pratchat5 – Ten Points to Viper House

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In episode five, comedian Richard McKenzie joins us to discuss that rare beast, a Discworld tale that stars no wizards, witches, watches or Death, and isn’t part of any of the ongoing storylines: Pyramids! Terry Pratchett’s seventh Discworld novel, published in 1989, it’s chock-full of jokes, footnotes, gods and great characters – but we’ll see almost none of them ever again…

Pteppicymon XXVIII – Teppic for short – is heir to the throne of the ancient river kingdom of Djelibeybi. But the kingdom is broke, having spent its money on pyramids, and in order to give him a profession, Teppic is sent to the best school on the Disc: the Assassin’s Guild in Ankh-Morpork. Seven years later he’s just taken his final exam when his father dies. Teppic is now King (and God) of Djelibeybi earlier than planned – and after so long away, he finds the ancient traditions of his homeland stifling. Can even the King challenge the authority of the kingdom’s high priest, Dios?

Though it features none of his most beloved characters, Pyramids is nonetheless a favourite among Discworld fans – not least because the first quarter of the book takes us into the classrooms of Ankh-Morpork’s most famous guild. What do you think of this tale of tradition, family and mathematics gone wrong? Let us know! Use the hashtag #Pratchat5 on social media.

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Guest Richard McKenzie is a comedian best known for his storytelling style. Though he rarely performs standup anymore, he hosts trivia twice a week, on Thursdays and Sundays, at the Cornish Arms on Sydney Road in Brunswick, Melbourne. Make sure to use a Pratchett pun in your team name if you go!

You can read the full show notes and errata for this episode on our web site.

Our next book, for our April 8th episode, takes us outside the Discworld – and indeed the fantasy genre – for 2012’s tale of Victorian London: Dodger! Joining us to talk about toshers, geezers and peelers is a man who’s no stranger to fancy words, and better known by his initials: crypto-cruciverbalist and former Letters & Numbers dictionary master, David Astle! We’ll be recording on March 24th, so get your questions in before then if you’d like us to answer them on the podcast. You can use the hashtag #Pratchat6 to ask them via social media. (And check out the Episodes page if you want to see a bit further into our future schedule!)

#Pratchat4 Notes and Errata

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Theses are the show notes and errata for episode 4, “Enter Three Wytches“, featuring guest Ell Squires (aka Clara Cupcakes) discussing the 1988 Discworld novel Wyrd Sisters.

  • Footrot Flats is as much remembered for the 1986 animated movie Footrot Flats: The Dog’s Tail Tale, which was a box office smash in New Zealand and Australia and gave the world Dave Dobbyn’s number one hit single “Slice of Heaven”.
  • Alice in The Vicar of Dibley was portrayed by Emma Chambers, also known for her role as Honey in Notting Hill. Sadly, Emma died at the age of 53 only a couple of weeks after this episode was released, on February 21st 2018.
  • Maggie Smith famously played Hogwarts professor Minerva McGonagall in all eight Harry Potter films, while Tilda Swinton was the villainous White Witch in three films based on C S Lewis’ Narnia books. Anjelica Huston played the Grand High Witch in 1990’s film version of Roald Dahl’s The Witches. Miriam Margoyles is also a Hogwarts alumnus, playing Professor Pomona Sprout in two of the Potter films.
  • Willow meets the disappointingly non-magical “Daughters of Gaea” in the season four Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode “Hush” – previously mentioned in our second episode!
  • While we couldn’t confirm the existence of a town named Fuck, there are places in the UK named Marsh Gibbon, Lickfold, Great Snoring, Crapstone and Shitterton. There is a town named Fucking in Lower Austria; their street signs were stolen so often by English-speaking tourists they had to start bolting them down.
  • “The Hedgehog Can Never Be Buggered At All”, usually referred to as “The Hedgehog Song“, is the infamous folk song sung by Nanny Ogg whenever she’s had a few. Wyrd Sisters is the first time it is mentioned.
  • For those playing at home, the name of the demon summoned in Nanny Ogg’s wash basin is WxrtHltl-jwlpklz. The Superman character Ben mentions is Mister Mxyzptlk, an “imp from the fifth dimension”. Ben did not pronounce his name correctly either.
  • The woman who gives Poirot his pin in the television series is Mme. Vergine Mesnard, who appears in only one Poirot case, set at a very early point in his career, when he was still a policeman in Belgium. She does not give him a pin in the original short story.
  • If you’re interested in the story behind Dutton’s remarks about African gangs, here’s a good article from The Big Smoke Australia. (“The Big Smoke” is Australian slang for city.)
  • Our musings about the Librarian disagree with fan consensus, which is that his status as a member of the Unseen University faculty means he must be a wizard (and, quite possibly, the Wizard Formerly Known As Horace Worblehat). We’re sticking with our assessment for now, but we may revisit this in future episodes.
  • You can hear examples of the “real Shakespearean accent“, known as the Original Pronunciation (OP), in this video from the Open University featuring father and son duo David and Ben Crystal.
  • History records that Rasputin survived being poisoned and shot, but was then shot again before his body was dumped in the river. He didn’t get out. (Anastasia trumps history, of course.)

#Pratchat4 – Enter Three Wytches

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In episode four, vaudevillian Elly Squires – aka Clara Cupcakes – joins us to discuss one of her first Discworld books, and the start of the witches series proper: Wyrd Sisters! Terry Pratchett’s sixth Discworld novel, published in 1988, it’s the second book to feature Granny Weatherwax – but the first to introduce her fellow witches, Nanny Ogg and Magrat Garlick.

Seasoned witches Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg are adjusting to life in a coven with recently graduated apprentice Magrat Garlick when the king of their tiny kingdom Lancre is murdered. The old king’s baby son escapes – right into the witch’s arms. They send him off to be raised by a troupe of travelling actors, while the usurper Duke Felmet is crowned king, aided in his tyrranical rule by his equally cruel wife. Granny, Nanny and Magrat must contend with rumour, theatre and their own clashing personalities if they are to change their kingdom’s story…

The witches are one of Pratchett’s most beloved groups of characters, and pre-date both the City Watch and the modern faculty of Unseen University – so it’s surprising to see them spring so fully-formed from their first novel! We loved meeting them all over again. We’d love to hear what you think of Wyrd Sisters – if you’re joining this episode’s discussion on social media, please use the hashtag #Pratchat4 so we can all find each other’s thoughts! (Big thanks to listener Jodie for this brilliant idea.)

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Elly Squires can be found on Twitter as her alter-ego @claracupcakes. She’s touring her hit 2017 Melbourne International Comedy Festival show, The Worst, to various festivals around Australia and the world, including Fringe World in Perth and the Edinburgh Fringe in Scotland. Keep an eye out for her tour dates on Facebook or (if you’re not afraid of Russian hackers) at claracupcakes.com.

You can read the full show notes and errata for this episode on our web site.

Our next book, discussed in our March 8th episode, will be 1989’s standalone Discworld novel, Pyramids – and joining us to talk about assassins, gods and a very different tiny kingdom will be comedian Richard McKenzie! We’ll be recording on February 19th, so get your questions in before then if you’d like us to answer them on the podcast! You can use the hashtag #Pratchat5 to ask them via social media.

Want to help us get to the end of our six(ish) year mission and read every Pratchett book – and more? You can support us with a tip, or a subscription for as little as $2 a month, and that’s cuttin’ our own throats! See our Support Us page for details.

#Pratchat3 Notes and Errata

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Theses are the show notes and errata for episode 3, “You’re a Wizzard, Rincewind”, featuring guest Cal Wilson, discussing the fifth Discworld novel, 1989’s Sourcery.

Iconographic Evidence

The photo used as publicity for Cal’s 2018 show Hindsight.

Notes and Errata

  • The episode title riffs on Hagrid’s famous words to an unbelieving Harry Potter in the first novel (and film), Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone: “Your’s a wizard, Harry!”
  • Freddie Mercury was a first son of a son of undetermined order, so his magical powers clearly came from somewhere else.
  • Ben talks a lot about Dungeons & Dragons this episode; if you’ve no idea what it’s all about, his article “What Even Is Dungeons & Dragons?” will get you up to speed. (Content note: the article is a little sweary.)
  • Some of Terry’s thoughts on J K Rowling can be found online in his interview with The Age here: “Mystery lord of the Discworld”, Peter Fray, November 6, 2004.
  • A person who doesn’t realise they’re no good at what they do might have a form of cognitive bias known as the Dunning-Kruger effect, named for a 1999 psychological study.
  • Hook turns might not be widely used by cars outside of Melbourne, but they’re a common way for bicycles to turn across traffic at cross intersections in many parts of the world.
  • The Annotated Pratchett File (APF for short) is a brilliant source of information on the various references in the novels. We also recommend the Discworld & Terry Pratchett Wiki, also hosted by the L-Space Web.

#Pratchat3 – You’re a Wizzard, Rincewind

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In episode three, comedian Cal Wilson is back to discuss the book that started her passion for Terry Pratchett – Sourcery! It’s the fifth Discworld novel, published in 1989, and both revisits locations and characters from the first two books and takes us to new parts of the Disc.

Happy to have left his adventuring days behind him, inept “wizzard” Rincewind now works as assistant librarian at Unseen University, the Disc’s premiere college for wizards. But just as a new archchancellor is about to be named, a young boy arrives. Coin is the eighth son of an eighth son of an eighth son: a Sourcerer, a source of raw magic not seen on the Disc since the ancient time of the Mage Wars. As Coin takes over the university and wizards across the world awaken to power they’ve never known, the end of the world draws nigh…and Rincewind just can’t seem to avoid getting involved.

Rincewind was Pratchett’s first protagonist, and this novel exemplifies all the things that make us love him: genre-awareness, unrepentant cowardice, reluctant heroism, lack of any skill at wizardry and fierce self-identification as a wizard. It also sees the return of the Luggage, a living chest which follows Rincewind wherever he goes. It was a delight for us all to see these characters again, and we have grand plans to go back to their beginnings in the very first Discworld novels…

In the meantime, when you’ve finished listening to this episode, get ready for the next one by reading Wyrd Sisters! We’ll be recording on January 14th, so get your questions in ASAP if you’d like us to answer them on the podcast.

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Guest Cal Wilson (she/her) was one of Australia and New Zealand’s most beloved comedians. She previously appeared in our first episode, “Boots Theory“, and would return for our fiftieth episode, “Salt Rat Arsenic Heat”. At the time of publishing Cal was about to tour a new live stand-up show, Hindsight, in multiple cities at festivals throughout 2018. (You can see the poster she mentions in our episode notes.) Cal passed away unexpectedly after a brief illness in October 2023; she is sorely missed. GNU Cal Wilson.

You can find the full notes and errata for this episode on our web site.

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#Pratchat2 Notes and Errata

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Theses are the show notes and errata for episode 2, “Murdering a Curry“, featuring guest Stephanie Convery discussing the fourth Discworld novel, 1988’s Mort.

  • Sir Terry’s own thoughts on where to start reading the Discworld are most clearly outlined in the essay “Straight from the Heart, Via the Groin”, which is most easily found in the 2014 non-fiction collection A Slip of the Keyboard.
  • “Mort” does mean death, but it’s not Latin – it’s French (or in Discworld terms, Quirmian).
  • A “squib” in the world of Harry Potter is the rare child of a magical person who is not magical themselves.
  • The lead Gentleman in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode Hush was played by Doug Jones, now famous for playing Abe Sapien in the Hellboy films, the Faun and the Pale Man in Pan’s Labyrinth, and Saru in Star Trek Discovery. He plays Count Orlok, the titular vampire, in the upcoming remake of Nosferatu. And he’d make a great Death.
  • Christopher Lee was the voice of Death in both Cosgrove Hall animated adaptations (Wyrd Sisters and Soul Music), and The Mob’s live-action adaptation of The Colour of Magic, following Ian Richardson’s death. And his Death. (Richardson played Death in The Mob’s first Discworld adaptation, Hogfather.) The body of Death was played by Marnix Van Den Broeke, who also played the golem Mr Pump in Going Postal.
  • The horse that plays Bucephalus in Gilliam’s The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is, unfairly, not named in the credits of the film.