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What was the rascal? I don't remember that part.
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Oct 2, 2007 11:18
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Keshik posted:What is the name of the female assassin Vimes meets at the beginning of Thud? Wasn't that at the start of Night Watch? Krinkle posted:What was the rascal?
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Oct 2, 2007 14:31
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Detetsu posted:Wasn't that at the start of Night Watch? Yeah, she's in Night Watch.
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Oct 2, 2007 16:40
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Anyone who's interested in starting the discworld series might find this a handy resource. 
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Oct 2, 2007 16:49
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Perhaps if one could read it.
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Oct 2, 2007 19:21
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Detetsu posted:Wasn't that at the start of Night Watch? Ah, drat. Thud! and Night Watch were basically the same book anyway. Not much comedy, very dark. Night Watch is possibly one of the best books Pratchett's written and my least favorite of the Vimes series because it doesn't have Carrot. Call me a royalist, but Carrot is one of the best characters of the entire series. In fact, I'd go so far as to list my favorites in the following order: Havelock Vetinari, Carrot Ironfoundersson, Lu-Tze. Vetinari and Carrot are, I suspect, the only people on the Disc who would actually notice the presence of Lu-Tze.
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Oct 2, 2007 19:25
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Was there seriously some sort of flame war about terry prachett a page ago that ended with people reporting each other for "flaming"? Jesus that's pathetic.
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Oct 2, 2007 19:54
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bobula posted:Perhaps if one could read it. Yes, well heres a link http://www.lspace.org/books/reading-order-guides/
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Oct 2, 2007 20:27
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maxnmona posted:Was there seriously some sort of flame war about terry prachett a page ago that ended with people reporting each other for "flaming"? Jesus that's pathetic. book related custom red titles? Or is the book barn not worth the effort?
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Oct 2, 2007 23:29
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Krinkle posted:book related custom red titles? Or is the book barn not worth the effort? HERE IS YOUR loving COW
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Oct 3, 2007 02:38
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Nilbop posted:HERE IS YOUR loving COW LEOPARDS DON'T WEAR SHORTS, FUCKWIT
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Oct 3, 2007 09:25
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I haven't read Making Money yet - I tend to wait for the paperbacks of Pratchett for the sake of my shelves - but from what has been said in the thread about Enron/Rand/Smith etc etc is all very well and good, but it's probably worth bearing in mind that as Terry is an English author, he is more than likely drawing on current events surrounding privatisation of public assets in the UK, both current under "New" Labour (large bits of the NHS, academies, the Post Office etc.) and past under the Tories (the railways, utilities, BT etc.). As a Private Eye reader the character of Reacher Gilt, as described in this thread, sounds like one of the City-based fat cat villains who turn up regularly in the In The Back section. Thoughts, anyone?
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Oct 3, 2007 13:58
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Nilbop posted:HERE IS YOUR loving COW Anyway, I sort of dislike Carrot. He was cool in the first book but then he just became some sort of Ankh-Morpork god and I think Pratchett goes overboard with everyone instantly liking him, doing as he says, blah blah, it's kind of boring.
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Oct 3, 2007 19:24
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Bonus posted:Anyway, I sort of dislike Carrot. He was cool in the first book but then he just became some sort of Ankh-Morpork god and I think Pratchett goes overboard with everyone instantly liking him, doing as he says, blah blah, it's kind of boring. I think there's fertile ground to explore when a sufficiently nasty villain shows up who's absolutely unaffected by Carrot's K'risma. Then again, that pretty much happened at the end of Fifth Elephant - and seeing Carrot get his rear end handed to him by a werewolf was a very satisfying moment.
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Oct 3, 2007 22:13
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what did Vimes call the Queensbury rules? The "put up your dukes" fancy prancing that old timey boxers use? The ones that Carrot tried to use and had his arm broken?
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Oct 3, 2007 22:15
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Krinkle posted:what did Vimes call the Queensbury rules? The "put up your dukes" fancy prancing that old timey boxers use? The ones that Carrot tried to use and had his arm broken? The Marquise of Fantailler Rules, which largely consisted of a list of places people weren't allowed to hit him.
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Oct 3, 2007 22:20
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PresterJohn posted:The Marquise of Fantailler Rules, which largely consisted of a list of places people weren't allowed to hit him. Stuff the bloody Marquise of Fantailler and his rules. I always enjoy the footnotes in Pratchett's books, and it's interesting to see the Librarian foot notes evolve over time where it's originally just an explanation of his origin to the point where everyone just views him as this sort of Librarian blob and nothing else.
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Oct 3, 2007 23:28
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Detetsu posted:I always enjoy the footnotes in Pratchett's books They're always the best jokes, in my opinion. There's the always amusing Fingers Mazda, of course, but another favorite is the one from Feet of Clay. quote:'Right you are, Captain Carrot!' said the dwarf baker. 'C'mon, lads! Let's hang 'em up by the bura'zak-ka'!*
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Oct 4, 2007 05:59
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Detetsu posted:I always enjoy the footnotes in Pratchett's books, and it's interesting to see the Librarian foot notes evolve over time where it's originally just an explanation of his origin to the point where everyone just views him as this sort of Librarian blob and nothing else. There is a good discussion on this very issue in Terry Practchett: Guilty of Literature. I grabbed the book from my university's library, so I am not sure how easy it is to get a hold of elsewhere. It's a good read though if you are interested in the themes behind his writing.
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Oct 4, 2007 10:30
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PresterJohn posted:The Marquise of Fantailler Rules, which largely consisted of a list of places people weren't allowed to hit him. To visualize it, imagine an early 1890’s man with a wax mustache trying to box while holding hands in front of him, knuckles facing the other person. Its like that, or that is always how I’ve read it. It’s like that SNL Skit with Conan O’Brien where he is pretending to be the first white man to box a black guy.
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Oct 4, 2007 15:41
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Vernon T. Waldrip from O Brother Where Art Thou? is a master of Marquise of Fantailler combat.
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Oct 4, 2007 20:42
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Does anyone remember which book it is where someone talks about grabbing time by the forelock? I'm pretty sure it's a Watch book, but it could just as easily be one of the Monks books or even one of the Susan ones. There's a quote somewhere in that certain book along the lines of 'Grab a hold of Time by the forelock, since she's got nothing on behind' or something.
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Oct 11, 2007 23:05
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Augustus Artorius posted:Does anyone remember which book it is where someone talks about grabbing time by the forelock? I'm pretty sure it's a Watch book, but it could just as easily be one of the Monks books or even one of the Susan ones. I'm thinking Thief of Time, when Nanny Ogg's expert services are required, but I can't find anything with Google. Edit: After a quick scan through this, there seems not to be any mention of the word 'forelock', so who knows? Big Bad Beetleborg fucked around with this message at 08:50 on Oct 12, 2007 |
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Oct 12, 2007 08:37
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Finished Men at Arms this morning. Finally something without witches. Three out of the last four I've read were Witch books. I'm reading them in the order they're in on the list in one of the first pages, taking into account that list is backwards, although somehow I read Small Gods before Moving Pictures. I'm really looking forward to Soul Music, being that's one of my other interests besides reading. Anyway, a question: Didn't Gaspode die at the end of Moving Pictures? I know the answer is probably that the series isn't really in any sort of chronological order, but it just bothered me a little. Carrot seems to have changed quite a bit while we weren't looking too, he went from Woody on Cheers to...to something else. LooseChanj fucked around with this message at 09:09 on Oct 14, 2007 |
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Oct 12, 2007 18:21
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LooseChanj posted:
Gaspode does not die at the end of Moving Pictures. As the magic of the clicks fades away, he loses his powers of speech and awareness and becomes a normal dog again. In later books, its explained that he regained the ability while scavenging around Unseen University - the residual magic energy there brought it back.
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Oct 12, 2007 18:46
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Making Money was awesome. Thud! was way darker and kinda moodier than Making Money, which I have no problem with, it was an awesome book, but Making Money was like a return to the more lighter-of-heart Discworld books. I had a lot of good laughs during it, well worth a read. 
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Oct 13, 2007 02:56
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LooseChanj posted:Moving Pictures stuff Spoilers please, I haven't read Moving Pictures. 
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Oct 14, 2007 02:38
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Fishbulbz posted:Spoilers please, I haven't read Moving Pictures. You have now.
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Oct 14, 2007 05:39
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Fishbulbz posted:Spoilers please, I haven't read Moving Pictures. Oops, sorry. Trust me though, you're not missing much. It's the only discworld novel I didn't enjoy much.
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Oct 14, 2007 09:11
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LooseChanj posted:Oops, sorry. Trust me though, you're not missing much. It's the only discworld novel I didn't enjoy much. Unusually weak book, mostly because the main characters are not all that compelling. On the other hand, Ponder Stibbons and Gaspode get their introduction, and Detritus starts to move out into the spotlight. As for Making Money, it's not as strong as Going Postal, and probably not even as good as The Truth. Part of the problem, at least for me, was the shaky use of economics. The Golem Standard was clearly written in to introduce the Labor Value of money, which is essentially what we use today. But the element it introduces -- AM suddenly has an unstoppable army able to CONQUER THE WORLD -- overshadows its use as a mere monetary basis. It's hard to get excited about, you know, fiscal backing when the entire city is fighting over a superweapon. And for a book primarily about classical economics, the treatment of the Golem Army takes an unexpected turn. Pratchett seemed to be arguing for a Nobility of Work theory, where the city and people gain worth simply by working. And also that turning the Golem Army loose would shock the social order of the City to its core. The second part is definitely true. But the first? The Golems are the equivalent of fairly impressive machines that improve productive capacity. Aren't a lot of AM residents still starving & underhoused, thanks mostly to the limitations of local technology? You could feed a lot of people with those Golems. And they're going to be underused simply to run telegraphs? I don't know.
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Oct 14, 2007 16:14
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Copernic posted:Unusually weak book, mostly because the main characters are not all that compelling. What ruined it for me was the rather clumsy way some of the tech was shoehorned in. I mean, c'mon, if you go so far as to invent *film*, why the hell do you need imps painting on it? That's just straight out of the Flintstones. Why not go the full 9 years and just make it photography?
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Oct 14, 2007 16:56
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Copernic posted:. The Golem Standard was clearly written in to introduce the Labor Value of money, which is essentially what we use today. But the element it introduces -- AM suddenly has an unstoppable army able to CONQUER THE WORLD -- overshadows its use as a mere monetary basis. It's hard to get excited about, you know, fiscal backing when the entire city is fighting over a superweapon. It's covered in the book, using them would supply all the labour so the people who are starving and underhoused would now be starving, underhoused and unemployed and that'll just make things worse. Really, all the bases are covered by Moist's and Vetanari's conversation, trying to go deeper is, well, going too deep -- it's a Discworld novel for god's sake.
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Oct 14, 2007 19:56
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Grum posted:It's covered in the book, using them would supply all the labour so the people who are starving and underhoused would now be starving, underhoused and unemployed and that'll just make things worse. Really, all the bases are covered by Moist's and Vetanari's conversation, trying to go deeper is, well, going too deep -- it's a Discworld novel for god's sake. But that makes no sense. Perhaps they'll be unemployed. But starving and underhoused? The golems are capable of growing all the food and building all the housing. The golems really represent a world of no scarcity. I can accept that scarcity is an important thing because it forces us to be productive, create new technology, and otherwise grow the civilization. But it's not *all* bad to have an untiring army of workers who can do everything for you. I think Pratchett was referring to a situation where the money economy dries up. Which it would, just like in a credit crunch. But we wouldn't need money anymore, golems would provide everything we would ordinarily buy. I thought a more realistic fear was that we'd all end up like the humans in Asimov's more decadent societies. The robots do all the work, we just sit around and drink beer and get stupid. Is that so bad? It's not even clear we'd be unemployed. Wright's The Golden Age is a great riposte to the "If they do all the work, there'll be no work" argument.
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Oct 14, 2007 22:54
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Copernic posted:But that makes no sense. Perhaps they'll be unemployed. But starving and underhoused? The golems are capable of growing all the food and building all the housing. The golems really represent a world of no scarcity. I can accept that scarcity is an important thing because it forces us to be productive, create new technology, and otherwise grow the civilization. But it's not *all* bad to have an untiring army of workers who can do everything for you. I think Pratchett just got his economics wrong. And didn't want a post-scarcity economy forever changing the discworld. I disagree with the guy above who said Moving Pictures was the worst discworld novel; it was good if only because it introduced Gaspode, who might be my favorite character on the Disc. The worst discworld novel was Monstrous Regiment -- I think i've read every published discworld novel, and it's the only one i've read that was just a flat out artistic failure, predictable, trite, and boring, a bad novel.
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Oct 15, 2007 01:53
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Calenth posted:I disagree with the guy above who said Moving Pictures was the worst discworld novel ... The worst discworld novel was Monstrous Regiment Hey you're both wrong; the worst discworld novel is Eric. Or maybe people's tastes differ.
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Oct 15, 2007 18:08
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PresterJohn posted:Hey you're both wrong; the worst discworld novel is Eric. What's wrong with Eric? The Tezuman section drags a little, but everything after that is solid gold. Especially Pratchett's digression on high-degree boredom during the Hell section.
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Oct 15, 2007 18:53
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Oxxidation posted:What's wrong with Eric? Maybe. People's. Tastes. Differ.
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Oct 15, 2007 19:01
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PresterJohn posted:Maybe. People's. Tastes. Differ. Yeah but what's wrong with Eric?
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Oct 15, 2007 19:07
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Grum posted:Yeah but what's wrong with Eric? I didn't like it. I liked Moving Pictures more. I liked Monstrous Regiment much more than either. I could come up with a bunch of elaborate justifications but either your tastes match mine and you don't care or your tastes diverge and you'll take issue with whatever I come up with so what's the point?
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Oct 15, 2007 19:24
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Obviously you're wrong in a way that can be proven objectively.
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Oct 15, 2007 19:45
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