Vale, Terry Pratchett

(Photo © Luigi Novi / Wikimedia Commons)

Like me, many of you will have been saddened to hear that Terry Pratchett passed away on 12 March 2015.

Normally, the entries in this blog contain my thoughts on books and films I have recently read or viewed.  If I also reviewed books I read in the past, then there would be entries for almost all of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels.  Today I will make an exception and put down a few thoughts about the works of one of my favourite authors.

Before Terry Pratchett came into my life there was Tolkien and Fritz Leiber.  I happily spent many hours in Middle-Earth and Lankhmar.  I came across the first Discworld novel, The Colour of Magic, in the early Eighties, just prior to the publication of its sequel The Light Fantastic.  I enjoyed Pratchett's gentle parodying of Tolkien and Leiber in those books.

Parody is a fine thing, but it is unsustainable in the long run.  The next two Discworld books, Equal Rites and Mort, were well-written, tightly plotted and mildly comic.  The parody had been abandoned, thankfully, but was yet to be replaced by something more substantial.  These two novels expanded our knowledge of the Discworld and its inhabitants, especially Granny Weatherwax and Death (the former in a very nascent conception).

In Sourcery, the fifth book in the sequence, something very perplexing happened.  Pratchett basically flattened his world (pun intended) and tore apart what he had built up.  Why would he do such a thing?  The answer can be found in the subsequent novels, starting with The Wyrd Sisters, and it is that substantial something I mentioned earlier: satire -  razor-sharp satire combined with a genius comedic touch, levity and gravity mixed in perfect proportions.  What had gone before simply would not support the scope of his new literary project, and fresh ground was needed.

How thankful we can be for this great leap forward.  Pratchett's Discworld became a foundry for creating dozens of memorable characters, comparable to Dickens at his finest.  In the series we see Granny Weatherwax turned from a prudish, vain woman into an iron-hard force of nature, joined by Magrat Garlick and the ebullient and naughty Nanny Ogg.  Ridcully, his fellow wizards and the Librarian cause magical mayhem at Unseen University.  Death has inter-dimensional adventures.  The City Watch is created, and Sam Vimes spars with Havelock Vetinari, the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork.  Dwarfs, Trolls, Golems and the Undead are added to the increasingly inclusive and cosmopolitan city.  Rincewind and The Luggage, C.M.O.T Dibbler, Fred Colon and Nobby Nobbs, Cohen the Barbarian, The Duck Man, Bloody Stupid Johnson, Wee Mad Arthur - the list goes on and on. And during all of their fantastical, comical and improbable doings, Pratchett holds up the mirror of satire so we can see ourselves all the more clearly.

I have been fortunate enough to have spent the last 30 years looking forward to the next Terry Pratchett Discworld novel. There have been 40 novels in the series released in that time, with another due out this year.  Very fortunate, indeed.  

My favourite of the books is The Truth - have you ever wondered who writes the stuff in gossip columns?  And my favourite line comes from Hogfather.  Mr Teatime is in a standoff with Death.  The stakes are cosmologically high.  "No last minute stuff!" Teatime demands.  And Death replies ... well, you'll just have to read the book to find out what he says.

Vale, Terry Pratchett.  It has been both a joy and a privilege to have discovered and followed your work for all these years.