Reviews of The Colour of Magic (1983) and related work
- Sequel: The Light Fantastic (1986)
- Spin-off: “Troll Bridge” (1992)
- Adaptation: “Troll Bridge” (2019)
- Spin-off: “Troll Bridge” (1992)
- Spin-off: Equal Rites (1987)
- Sequel: Wyrd Sisters (1988)
- Adaptation: Wyrd Sisters (1997)
- Sequel: Witches Abroad (1991)
- Sequel: Lords and Ladies (1992)
- Sequel: Wyrd Sisters (1988)
- Spin-off: Mort (1987)
- Sequel: Reaper Man (1991)
- Sequel: Soul Music (1994)
- Sequel: Sourcery (1988)
- Spin-off: Guards! Guards! (1989)
- Sequel: Men at Arms (1993)
- Spin-off: Pyramids (1989)
- Spin-off: Small Gods (1992)
- Sequel: Eric (1990)
- Spin-off: Moving Pictures (1990)
- Spin-off: “The Pratchett Portfolio” (1996)
The Colour of Magic (1983
)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
Rincewind, a failed wizard with a talent for languages, takes up employment guiding the Discworld’s first tourist around the Unnamed Continent.
This novel is the first in a series of 41 novels, plus a few short stories, written by Pratchett and set on the Discworld. It is typically comical, but it is atypical in many ways: Its plot is a disjointed picaresque, the characters are relatively thin, it ends on a cliffhanger, and its main subject of parody is the literary genre of fantasy itself. Plotwise, the first section—involving a fire in Ankh-Morpork—would have sufficed to fill one of the later novels. Foundational works parodied here include:
- The geography is Larry Niven’s Ringworld (1970) turned on its side, plus a Hindu mythology.
- The magic system is from Jack Vance’s The Dying Earth (1950) via Dungeons & Dragons.
- Bravd and the Weasel are Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser from stories like “The Howling Tower” (1941). Pratchett confirmed this but denied that Ankh-Morpork is Leiber’s Lankhmar. Pratchett’s scenes at Dunmanifestin are Leiber’s similarly interstitial scenes at Godshome, also part of the Swords series of short-story collections about Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser.
- Hrun is Robert E. Howard’s Conan. Hrun’s birthplace, Chimeria, is Howard’s Cimmeria, but Hrun himself is perhaps filtered through Carl Critchlow’s Thrud.
- The Wyrmberg section is Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonflight (1968).
- Kring is Michael Moorcock’s Stormbringer. The connection Pratchett makes between the number eight and magic may be derived from Moorcock’s eight-pointed emblem of Chaos.
- Bel-Shamharoth is H. P. Lovecraft’s Yog-Sothoth, via Lovecraft’s imitators in sword and sorcery.
Pratchett’s tourist character, Twoflower, represents a social satire of contemporary behaviour that is more representative of the later novels. He’s an oblivious British 1980s tourist, with a camera and difficulty tracking his luggage. The name Rincewind, but not the character, is from J. B. Morton’s satirical work under the name Beachcomber. His alma mater, the Unseen University, is a pun on the 17th-century Invisible College, buried among Pratchett’s funnier astronomical puns.
Given the focus on genre self-parody, Rincewind makes a good protagonist. To me, he represents the kind of drop-out university student who has been disillusioned by a look at the true complexity of the world and the difficulty of understanding it. The irony is that in Rincewind’s case, he literally studied efficacious magic and was still disillusioned. By that trick, Rincewind also represents the petty, nit-picking reader like me who goes looking for self-consistency in a fantasy world. Pratchett crams in several good jokes about the laws of nature on the Discworld, making them at once self-contradictory in outline and conservative in effect. For example, the difficulty of achieving something by magic on the Discworld cannot be less than the difficulty of achieving it by other means, negating the fabulist idea of magic as getting what you want without the effort. Pratchett, himself a nit-picking SFF fan, would remain basically consistent in his own worldbuilding for the next 40 novels.
References here: Moving Pictures (1990), “Troll Bridge” (1992), After the Campfires (1998).
‣ The Light Fantastic (1986)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
It turns out that the reason for Rincewind’s long misfortune was not the games of the gods but a scheme to prevent the abuse of the eight fundamental spells of the Octavo, by putting one of them out of reach until an apocalyptic event when they are all needed.
Pratchett starts converging on the more coherent, character-centric storytelling he would be famous for. The means are not yet elegant, but you can see the author’s thoughts turning gradually away from fannish in-jokes to a long-term project more able to stand on its own. For example, the part introducing Herrena the barbarian heroine parodies the sexist objectification of women on fantasy book covers. This is a funny bit, standing in contrast to Pratchett’s objectification of bare-breasted barbarian women in the previous book. Unfortunately, Herrena would never be an important character. Trymon, the villain, is also funny: A parody of scientific-management ideology infiltrating the baroque academy of magic.
References here: Lords and Ladies (1992), Men at Arms (1993).
‣‣ “Troll Bridge” (1992)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
Cohen the Barbarian isn’t keeping up with the times.
Cohen is, even more than Hrun of The Colour of Magic (1983), a parody of Conan the Barbarian. He’s introduced in The Light Fantastic. This story is about the passing of his age of heroism, which is inconsistent with the earlier novels where younger heroes like Hrun are still perfectly current. There are bridge trolls still working in both The Colour of Magic and Equal Rites (1987).
‣‣‣ “Troll Bridge” (2019
)
Seen in 2021.
Crowdfunded, with end-credits filk. It has the same basic problem as Wyrd Sisters (1997), being too straight an adaptation, too literary, with almost no concern for differences in media.
moving picture adaptation fiction
‣ Equal Rites (1987)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
Esmeralda “Granny” Weatherwax, an elderly witch in the Ramtops, takes in a girl named Eskarina, whose magical gifts are worrisome.
With this novel, Pratchett graduated from the first novels’ frenetic sightseeing and parody of SFF to a different mode based on original characters.
There are only faint signs of a reboot. For example, Galder Weatherwax was Chancellor of the Unseen University in The Light Fantastic. A man named Cutangle is now Archchancellor. He and Granny Weatherwax turn out to be childhood friends while Galder Weatherwax isn’t mentioned. He would later be crowbarred back into continuity as a cousin of Granny’s. One attempt by fans to account for this has Galder dying in the same year that Eskarina is apprenticed to Granny, and yet, Cutangle seems never to have heard of a magical Weatherwax from the Ramtops.
There is ample continuity in other respects. A parallel journey of 500 miles is fast-forwarded in the same sort of disjointed picaresque as the previous books. Bel-Shamharoth makes another appearance, and the Lovecraftian-fantasy creatures from the Dungeon Dimensions drive the plot as they do in The Light Fantastic. The only great change is that Pratchett plays to his strengths. He refers openly to Gormenghast, the original “fantasy of manners” that is the model of this and each subsequent Discworld novel. Granny, in particular, is a fully realized and rounded character that brings life to the setting for the first time.
References here: Mort (1987), Sourcery (1988), Lords and Ladies (1992), “Troll Bridge” (1992).
‣‣ Wyrd Sisters (1988)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Most centrally, Macbeth (1606).
This is probably the first time Pratchett found a really rich premise for the Discworld. His witches are an improvement over Shakespeare and the trio in The Black Cauldron (1985), a similar compromise between stereotype and character. Of these witches, only Granny Weatherwax returns from Equal Rites, while the colleagues she had in that novel do not return here.
References here: Lords and Ladies (1992).
‣‣‣ Wyrd Sisters (1997)
Seen in 2018.
Oddly faithful. It preserves even the most literary jokes, which doesn’t make sense for a film, and it animates the silent movie gags instead of using film. It’s also too cheaply produced to bring any visual pleasure to the adaptation, and it adds a few stereotypes (like the enhanced appearance of WxrtHltl-jwl, pronounced here) but its overall faithfulness is sort of endearing.
References here: “Troll Bridge” (2019).
moving picture adaptation animation fiction series
‣‣ Witches Abroad (1991)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2023.
Fairy godmothers, good and bad.
This is a solid entry, except for the long middle section which mixes UK tourist satire with a picaresque. That part is similar to the first two Discworld books, but with a more complicated relationship with fiction. The main target here is not contemporary SFF but French fairy tales in the style of les précieuses and the later Charles Perrault, but sources aren’t discussed. Other “stories” referenced here and usable in magic include The Count of Monte Cristo (1844).
References here: Lords and Ladies (1992).
‣‣ Lords and Ladies (1992)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2023.
Elves. The proper evil kind.
Whereas Wyrd Sisters (1988) is a bit of a reboot from Equal Rites (1987), Lords and Ladies has more continuity than any previous Discworld novel. It unites the wizards from the first sub-series of Discworld novels with the witch sub-series again, and in so doing, it addresses Granny Weatherwax’s relationship with Galder Weatherwax from The Light Fantastic (1986): a point of no interest whatsover, except to make the series as a whole more internally consistent, which makes it better. More centrally, Magrat pursues her relationship with Verence from Wyrd Sisters, immediately upon her return from the journey described in Witches Abroad (1991), which is also referenced here. The relationship between Granny and Magrat was frayed and then patched up in Witches Abroad, but breaks here, in a fairly logical manner.
Aside from the continuity and the strong characters, the plotting is rather weak. I like how the elves torpedo the self-confidence of anyone who faces them, but their weakness to iron is fairytale magic with no humour or ingenuity to it. The wizards, however entertaining, don’t need to be present, and it’s an unlikely coincidence for Granny to be childhood friends with another archchancellor after Cutangle. These minor defects don’t matter much when Pratchett is at the very top of his game. Nanny Ogg’s bath scene is particularly good.
‣ Mort (1987)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
The trunk of the plot here is a moral coming-of-age fantasy like Equal Rites (1987), replacing the feminism with a rebellion against fate, and the Lovecraftian horrors with more novel forms of pastiche. Pratchett was happier with this one, and it is indeed more elegantly structured, without Equal Rites’s picaresque middle section.
‣‣ Reaper Man (1991)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
The impersonal powers that enforce the Discworld’s natural laws decide that Death has developed too much of a personality. They bump him off into retirement. This has unforeseen consequences, especially for senior wizard Windle Poons.
An excellent ensemble affair with three interacting plot threads and good ideas throughout. There is no apocalyptic threat. As in Moving Pictures (1990), modern technology is central: A blacksmith invents the combine harvester and the build-up of life force in Ankh produces a shopping mall. Both are used for good jokes and clever social commentary, not to substitute for a plot.
Death, by far the most common recurring character throughout the franchise, is the star, but Pratchett performs even better with the faculty of Unseen University and Poons’s new friends, the “Fresh Starters”. Since there’s not quite room for everything that’s going on, some of the characters in the latter plot thread are arguably too flat, and perhaps there is a touch of meanness in how they’re written. Reg Shoe is a cynically dismissive parody of a political activist. The Notfaroutoes (Nosferatus) are kitsch vampires, the joke being that they’re lower class and therefore inferior. A more conservative writer like J. K. Rowling would have dehumanized such characters because they’re out of alignment with the social hierarchy around them, but Pratchett is gentle, merely bringing out the humour in incongruity. By the same token, the ending is moving; Pratchett, who would die of early-onset Alzheimer’s in 2015, is able to juggle a personified Death in a situational comedy without ignoring what death means to real people.
‣‣ Soul Music (1994)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Like Moving Pictures (1990), it’s too thinly connected to the secondary world to achieve much.
‣ Sourcery (1988)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
Sensing doom, Rincewind escapes the Unseen University before the arrival of a child unleashes the other wizards.
This is an improvement in tone and plotting over The Light Fantastic, but a regression relative to the two spin-offs that had already been launched up to this point. As in The Light Fantastic and Equal Rites (1987), the ultimate threat in the plot is the Dungeon Dimensions responding to the careless use of magic, and there is a lot of magic in this one. Pratchett’s descriptions of that magic, and his jokes, are on point, but the detour to Klatch is a slurry of tiresome orientalism and simplistic characters. It doesn’t quite make sense, for example, that Rincewind is still incapable of magic after the Octavo’s spell has left him; he’s just not allowed to develop. It’s fun to see the Librarian taking a more significant role for the first time, as a kooky humanist after Pratchett’s own heart, as well as Vetinari being named after his initial appearance in the first book.
References here: Eric (1990), Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (1997).
‣ Guards! Guards! (1989)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
‣‣ Men at Arms (1993)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
The silicon brain heat sink is the perfect symbol of Pratchett’s Discworld: The mad genius of a late-night D&D session, building a world by probing its limits, including its limits as fiction. Its foundations were laid in The Light Fantastic (1986).
‣ Pyramids (1989)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
‣‣ Small Gods (1992)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2023.
The worshippers of Om assert that there is only one god and that the world is a sphere hurtling through space. They arrange to invade their neighbours, the philosophical yet practical Ephebians.
Here, the plot overtakes the characterization again and the pace is rapid, but this time the plot is very good.
‣ Eric (1990)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
Read in 2022.
Rincewind meets a 13-year-old summoner of demons.
A relatively short Discworld novel, originally released in an illustrated form, perhaps for a younger audience. This one is a light parody without a major threat, starting with the Faust myth in something like Marlowe’s version, not Goethe’s later Faust, Part One (1808). Pursuing the wishes of the demonologist, Pratchett parodies Mesoamerican religion and the myths of the Trojan War. In the latter, the incident with the Trojan Horse is central, not anything that happens in The Iliad (ca. 700 BCE) or its sequel. Pratchett does make a wonderfully level-headed version of Odysseus though.
This novel takes a closer look at demons on the Discworld, but much of the content is recycled. The parody of the Divine Comedy (1320) done to depict Hell is centred on an impopular new manager who resembles Trymon in The Colour of Magic but uses bad slogans rather than scientific management techniques. Eric the summoner is a lot like Nijel the Destroyer in Sourcery (1988). Rincewind is his usual self.
‣ Moving Pictures (1990)
Terry Pratchett (writer).
This one has got little to do with fantasy. Both a still-picture camera and a parody of early space travel were featured in The Colour of Magic (1983), but in this book, the parody of moving pictures, a modern technology, is central.
References here: Reaper Man (1991), Soul Music (1994).
‣ “The Pratchett Portfolio” (1996
)
Paul Kidby (artist), Terry Pratchett (writer).
Character portraits based on the first 18 Discworld novels.