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Josh Kirby's cover art was what attracted me to read them in the first place. In the late 80s I saw a paperback of The Colour of Magic on my art teacher's desk with the strapline 'Jerome K. Jerome meets The Lord of the Rings'.

I think his pictures are fantastic.

Yes, it's really subjective, eh? We got a couple of illustrators in the family, and they're always on about this stuff. I found that art really off-putting - for reasons I can't really articulate - but I know people love them, and dislike the more recent covers. Somebody I know who has always enjoyed stuff I write, didn't buy one of my books because they said the cover art was "too grim". The book was about grim stuff! With a grim title. And obviously about deeply grim things. Made me laugh - you can't win em all. And I get it.

I've been messaging with an illustrator this week who has done a fair bit of cover art in her time and I love her work. Had one of her prints on my wall for nearly 20 years and couldn't read the signature so only just stumbled on the original online, and realised who she is. Had to message her just to say how much I love her art. It can really change how (potential) readers feel - think we underestimate the power of cover art, often!
 
I'm lucky to live rather close to a place that has been twinned with Ankh-Morpork, has several streets named after places in his books and is also home to the only 'official' Discworld Emporium/Ankh-Morpork Consulate (said merchants had a gorgeous marmalade cat who was - maybe - the manager in disguise, but who normally was seen snoozing in the shop window á la Bagpuss).

discworld-emporium.jpg


Sir Terry had honorary Somerset citizenship and we occasionally saw him around and about prior to his last illness. Even if you weren't a fan of his writing, he's generally missed by us.
 
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I'm lucky to live rather close to a place that has been twinned with Ankh-Morpork, has several streets named after places in his books and is also home to the only 'official' Discworld Emporium/Ankh-Morpork Consulate (said merchants had a gorgeous marmalade cat who was - maybe - the manager in disguise, but who normally was seen snoozing in the shop window á la Bagpuss).

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Sir Terry had honorary Somerset citizenship and we occasionally saw him around and about prior to his last illness. Even if you weren't a fan of his writing, he's generally missed by us.
Love that. So nice to know his memory is treasured, where he lived.
 
Yes, it's really subjective, eh? We got a couple of illustrators in the family, and they're always on about this stuff. I found that art really off-putting - for reasons I can't really articulate - but I know people love them, and dislike the more recent covers. Somebody I know who has always enjoyed stuff I write, didn't buy one of my books because they said the cover art was "too grim". The book was about grim stuff! With a grim title. And obviously about deeply grim things. Made me laugh - you can't win em all. And I get it.

I've been messaging with an illustrator this week who has done a fair bit of cover art in her time and I love her work. Had one of her prints on my wall for nearly 20 years and couldn't read the signature so only just stumbled on the original online, and realised who she is. Had to message her just to say how much I love her art. It can really change how (potential) readers feel - think we underestimate the power of cover art, often!

Many moons ago I was at my grandparents' and reading Pratchett's Wyrd Sisters. My Gran asked me what I was reading, so hoping for a convert, I passed her the book. She took one look at the Josh Kirby cover and started wailing, I might as well have taken a dump on the carpet. She was horrified at the sight of his artwork. So, er, no, not everyone liked his stuff.
 
From The Discworld Companion (1994).

The Language Barrier: It's all Klatchian to Me

The Discworld books are translated into eighteen languages, including Japanese and Hebrew. They present astonishing pitfalls for the translator.

The problems are not (just) the puns, of which there are rather fewer than people imagine. In any case, puns are translatable; they might not be directly translatable, but the Discworld translators have to be adept at filleting an English pun from the text and replacing it with one that works in German or Spanish. What can loom in front of a translator like the proverbial radio on the edge of the bathtub of the future are the resonances and references.

Take Hogswatchnight, the Discworld winter festival. It's partly a pun on hog but also takes in 'Hogmanay' and the old Christian `Watch Night service on 31 December. Even if people don't directly spot this, it subconsciously inherits the feel of a midwinter festival.

Or there's the Morris Minor. To a Britisher 'an old lady who drives a Morris Minor' — and there's still a few of both around — is instantly recognisable as a 'type'. You could probably even have a stab at how many cats she has. What's the Finnish equivalent? The German equivalent?

Translators in the science fiction and fantasy field have an extra problem. SF in particular is dominated by the English — or at least the American — language. Fans in mainland European and Scandinavian countries must read in English if they're to keep up with the field. This means that a foreign translator is working under the eyes of readers who're often buying the book to see how it compares with the English version they already have.

Ruurd Groot has the daunting task of translating not only the plot but also the jokes in the Discworld series into Dutch. Translating a pun is difficult but not impossible, he says, as long as it is a pun in the strict ‘linguistic’ sense: making fun by crossing the semantic and formal wires of words or expressions. And even when it proves impossible to invent an. equivalent pun for the destination language, a deft translator may solve the problem by ‘compensating’ — introducing a pun for another word somewhere else in the sentence in such a way that the value of the original pun is restored.

Strangely, the similarity of the English and Dutch languages is not always helpful. Many Dutch words and expressions have been borrowed from English and, of course, the same thing has happened in reverse, especially i in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; the English word ‘forlorn’, , for example, comes from the Dutch verloren = ‘lost’. The side effect of this circumstance is that many Dutch readers of Terry’s original English text do not always catch what he really wrote; words may look familiar, but meanings have changed with time.

In The Colour of Magic, Terry refers to the ‘Big Bang hypothesis’. Sadly for Ruurd, the erotic Bang-pun proved untranslatable. In Dutch, the theory translates as oerknal, which provides no hand-holds. However, they do refer to het uitdijend heelal — ‘the expanding universe’. Ruurd altered this slightly to the het Uitvrijend Model — sounding much the same — and which could be taken to mean ‘the Making Love Outwards Model’. When the author heard this he apparently sat there grinning and saying it’s the best-ever title for a scientific theory.

Much more difficult is the translation of jokes on local traditions or institutions well known to English readers. And there are special considerations here. Dutch readers of some sophistication (as readers of TP tend to be, it goes without saying) would never accept substituting a reference to a Dutch television series for a similar reference to a BBC serial.

Brits may blithely assume that everyone knows about morris dancing or ‘A’ levels, but it is the experience of the Dutch that most foreigners’ knowledge of their country tends to run. out somewhere south of the cheese, clogs and windmills department. Strangely enough, to a Dutch reader a reference to strictly Dutch ephemera would be jarring; they couldn’t imagine someone in Britain, let alone on the Discworld, being aware of them. Sad but true.

Translators for ‘large’ nationalities - German, French, and so on — can maintain the fiction that everyone else is German or French and just localize the jokes in question. ‘Small’ nationalities have to replace little items of English/British arcana by references to globally known international, or more famous English, items. On the Discworld, that most international, or rather interstellar, of locations, strictly English or British references are allowed in a Dutch translation only if they are globally known — like the works of Shakespeare in Wyrd Sisters.

Ruurd could rely on the fact that many Dutch people. know: Shakespeare, if only from television — played by British actors and subtitled in Dutch. But in Moving Pictures, problems.for the translator exceeded all reasonable proportions. The films referred to in the book are well enough known,but the average Dutch reader might not recognize many of the translated quotations from the dialogue.

In that case, he says, a translator can-rely on a harmless version of snob appeal. If someone doesn’t know or recognize something, the translator can write in a tone as.if anyone reading it of course will know all and... it turns out that they do ...

IK WEET-NIET WAT JIJ ERVAN VINDT, MAAR EEN BORD ROTTI ZOU ER WEL INGAAN

This is the closest that Ruurd could. get to Death’s line from Mort: ‘I DON’T KNOW ABOUT. YOU, BUT I COULD MURDER A CURRY.’ A line for line translation here is impossible: a different colonial past means that ‘curry’ is not a household word in Holland. Also ‘I could murder a...’ in the sense of ‘I could really enjoy a...' makes no sense in Dutch.

Casting aside. the avoidance of ‘localized’ Dutch expressions on this occasion, Ruurd opted for ‘rotti’. It is a near-funny word itself; having the same echo of ‘rotten’ as it-would in English. It belongs to the Surinam culinary tradition — Surinam having been. a small Dutch colony in South America. ‘Rotti’, like curry, is very hot stuff. Its mention in the context, with the vague implication that Surinam is cosmically more famous than the Netherlands, helps to replace for Dutch readers some of the fun lost during translation.

Granny Weatherwax, on the other-hand, presents no problems (at least, not yet: as Ruurd says, translators of a series have to try to avoid painting themselves into a corner). Her name translates. more literally into Opoe Esmee Wedersmeer, although Wéerwas. would be more direct. Weder is ye olde form of the word weer, meaning ‘weather’. The smeer part is a word used for greasy substances as applied to shoes or cart axles, but also for the stuff secreted in our ear passages (earwax = oorsmeer). There is an etymological link with the English word ‘smear’. Ruurd felt that the ordinary word in Dutch for ‘wax’ — was — seemed less suitable, as being too ordinary.

'Esmee' is, as in English, short for Esmerelda, and Ope is an obsolete endearing way of addressing grandmothers in Dutch. The term is still used to refer to certain old-fashioned ladies' bike - opoefietsen = 'granny bikes.'

This has overtones of the 'Morris Minor' ... you see? They have one after-all... ---- And finally, while googling, I came across an interesting issue with the french translation of Weatherwax. In French she's translated as "Mémé Circdutemps" a literal, grammatically correct translation. In the English Witches Abroad, Lilith goes by the name "Lilith du Tempscrire" (a grammatically bad translation of Weatherwax). This is a subtle hint to English readers, but if the name was used in the French books it would be a bit on the nose, so in French translations Lilith is known as Lilith Weatherwax.
 
Now, what I was actually looking into when I found that was whether the Anton Lesser narrated version of Small Gods for Radio 4 was good (I've loved his voice since I first heard him as Falco).

Alternatively,
does anybody have input on the respective merits of the audio versions by Nigel Planer and Tony Robinson?
 
In an update, I suggested the Teenager try "Equal Rites" when she was looking for a new read, and she liked it (and Granny Weatherwax) so much that I pushed her onto "Wyrd Sisters" afterwards. Finally, one of my offspring with whom I can discuss Discworld...
 
I accidentally watched some episodes of the BBC production.

Its interesting but not Pratchett
Is that 'The Watch'? I started watching that too - I agree, it's Pratchettian, without being Pratchett, which is a paradox I think El Tel would have enjoyed.
 
Reading another thread that featured Pratchett, l was suddenly reminded of what might be seen as a tragic foreshadowing:

Donkey’s years ago, when the Discworld novels were new-ish, TP was doing a tour of talks to publicise his latest one. I saw that he was coming to Boringtown library, so a pal of mine and l attended.

The presentation was everything you’d expect from TP: amusing, relevant and personal. One anecdote that sticks in my mind, however, concerns the illness that eventually robbed us of him: Terry mentioned that he’d started writing professionally using a primitive device that electronically burned text into aluminium foil, and laughingly made a comment about inhaling all that metal vapour, to the effect of, “If Alzheimer’s gets me, l’ll know the reason why!

:(

Somewhere, l still have the B & W photo that my pal took of me being presented with my copy of the new book by Terry. l must-must-must search it out.

maximus otter
 
Has anyone listened to the Audiobook or Making Money narrated by Richard Coyle? It says it has Bill Nighy and Peter Serafinowicz. BN tells the footnotes, but is Peter Serafinowicz just Death? I didn’t notice. I thought it was RC doing any other voice. Seems a bit of a waste.
 
It was mentioned in another thread about young people not knowing Terry Pratchett. It occurs to me that they might be quite hard work for young people (under say 30). The type of sf/fantasy people read has changed - not in my view for the better. There is the Harry Potter effect, which (to my mind) has infantilised the genre, even more so than Moorcock did in my youth.

Arguably, Moorcock's Runestaff books have a glimmer of the same humour that Sir Pterry did several times better, although much mid-period Moorcock is repetitively gloomy. I haven't reread any of them in 40 years, but I regularly re-read the Discworld books except for a couple of the early ones.

Plus, a lot of Discworld references to 'Realword' are dating fast. It would depend on what book one picked up first, of course.

Increasingly I think I was lucky to be born when I was.
 
It was mentioned in another thread about young people not knowing Terry Pratchett. It occurs to me that they might be quite hard work for young people (under say 30). The type of sf/fantasy people read has changed - not in my view for the better. There is the Harry Potter effect, which (to my mind) has infantilised the genre, even more so than Moorcock did in my youth.

Arguably, Moorcock's Runestaff books have a glimmer of the same humour that Sir Pterry did several times better, although much mid-period Moorcock is repetitively gloomy. I haven't reread any of them in 40 years, but I regularly re-read the Discworld books except for a couple of the early ones.

Plus, a lot of Discworld references to 'Realword' are dating fast. It would depend on what book one picked up first, of course.

Increasingly I think I was lucky to be born when I was.

None of this concerns me in and of itself, but is there anything of a similar ilk to fill the gap?

I don't know the answer to this, but I think there'll be a definite loss if there isn't.

Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett--above all the other authors I read as a teenager--influenced the way I wrote and spoke and thought.

It was Monty Python on a page: hyper-witty fizz with a substratum of sage wisdom about the nature of the universe, the way of the world, and what separated decent, fair people from plain bastards.

If contemporary readers see only white middle-aged baby-boomers, they haven't looked hard enough: Douglas the convert to ardent environmentalism and early digital-evangelist; Pratchett pushing against prejudice in all forms before it became required to be judged 'relevant'--and doing so with style.
 
It was mentioned in another thread about young people not knowing Terry Pratchett. It occurs to me that they might be quite hard work for young people (under say 30). The type of sf/fantasy people read has changed - not in my view for the better. There is the Harry Potter effect, which (to my mind) has infantilised the genre, even more so than Moorcock did in my youth.

Arguably, Moorcock's Runestaff books have a glimmer of the same humour that Sir Pterry did several times better, although much mid-period Moorcock is repetitively gloomy. I haven't reread any of them in 40 years, but I regularly re-read the Discworld books except for a couple of the early ones.

Plus, a lot of Discworld references to 'Realword' are dating fast. It would depend on what book one picked up first, of course.

Increasingly I think I was lucky to be born when I was.
My son in law (who's 28) loves Pratchett. I think it's not so much an 'age' thing as a 'do you read books' thing. None of the blokes in my discussion last night (which I think is what Cochise is referencing) are great readers of books, but instead are viewers of film and TV. So even my asking what they thought of Sir Pterry was a bit of a stretch, but I did think that his books may have permeated their consciousnesses. Obviously not.

Readers read, regardless of the vintage of the books, whatever their age. Unfortunately, increasingly - people don't read.
 
I think Pratchett is best consumed as the written word. A few adaptations for TV aren't too dreadful, but they miss such a lot of his observational wit that way.

Audio books are a good second best. I was never really taken with Interesting Times or Sourcery in book form, but read by Colin Morgan for Audible, they are wonderful.
 
I think Pratchett is best consumed as the written word. A few adaptations for TV aren't too dreadful, but they miss such a lot of his observational wit that way.

Audio books are a good second best. I was never really taken with Interesting Times or Sourcery in book form, but read by Colin Morgan for Audible, they are wonderful.

There are also meta-jokes that require the text.
 
There are also meta-jokes that require the text.
The Audible books do at least manage to get the footnotes in (best in the new versions, where Bill Nighy speaks them separately, rather than in the old versions where they just used to shove them into the main spoken text).
 
I’ve just got the Audio book of the Truth from Audible (after trying a book call Illuminations which was very strange and I didn’t realise the book of short stories had a VERY long story I wasn’t interested in so I got a refund and went for a safe bet in TP). It’s read by Matthew Baynton (Ghosts) I’ve only just started but he does seem excellent at the various voices.
 
A 'pub friend' of my own age admitted he'd never read Pratchett and borrowed The Colour of Magic. His opinion was he could see the style and the humour, but it just didn't entertain him.
 
True.
I tried to get him to read Wyrd Sisters - a personal favourite - but it was the humour that didn't click.
To my taste, I loved his writing, humour and gentle satire. I preferred his 'mid-range' faux medieval fantasy setting and sort of distanced myself the more technically advanced Discworld became.
The cover art changed (I love Kirby's style) and winced at the cover of Monstrous Regiment, with the Napoleonic period being hinted at.
 
The cover art changed (I love Kirby's style) and winced at the cover of Monstrous Regiment, with the Napoleonic period being hinted at.
The later books really do ramp up the way the magic begins to vanish from Discworld as the Industrial Revolution gathers steam. The Elves in one of the later Tiffany Aching books make this explicit: the iron is inimical to magic. It does become difficult reading on many levels: Pratchett was very well aware both of literary precedent - e.g. the Romantic longing for a prelapsarian paradise - and also the biological processes in his own brain: also inimical to magic.

Which leads me, at last, to chase up a passing reference I think I read on here years ago: a fairy character (not from Pratchett) recalling the smell of the air before the first coal fires heralded the onslaught of industry. It's a powerful image. Does anyone recognise the allusion?
 
The later books really do ramp up the way the magic begins to vanish from Discworld as the Industrial Revolution gathers steam. The Elves in one of the later Tiffany Aching books make this explicit: the iron is inimical to magic. It does become difficult reading on many levels: Pratchett was very well aware both of literary precedent - e.g. the Romantic longing for a prelapsarian paradise - and also the biological processes in his own brain: also inimical to magic.

Which leads me, at last, to chase up a passing reference I think I read on here years ago: a fairy character (not from Pratchett) recalling the smell of the air before the first coal fires heralded the onslaught of industry. It's a powerful image. Does anyone recognise the allusion?

No, but Shakespeare was very anti-coal and made several damning allusions to it. Are you referring to one of his plays—or even Spenser?
 
…a passing reference I think I read on here years ago: a fairy character (not from Pratchett) recalling the smell of the air before the first coal fires heralded the onslaught of industry. It's a powerful image. Does anyone recognise the allusion?

Possibly a garbled memory of the scene in the charming - and highly recommended- film Fairytale where the fleeing fairies encounter a column of cars bringing tourists to Cottingley? One of the intruders discards a cigarette end, and the little people recoil at its stink.

maximus otter
 
True.
I tried to get him to read Wyrd Sisters - a personal favourite - but it was the humour that didn't click.
To my taste, I loved his writing, humour and gentle satire. I preferred his 'mid-range' faux medieval fantasy setting and sort of distanced myself the more technically advanced Discworld became.
The cover art changed (I love Kirby's style) and winced at the cover of Monstrous Regiment, with the Napoleonic period being hinted at.
I also prefer the witches' books. I quite like the wizards and books set around the Unseen University, but find the guards can be a little hard to get on with. The later books became a bit more 'scatter-gun' and didn't appeal quite so much, although I still found them very funny. The earliest two or three books hardly feel like Discworld books at all, although I've just re-bought Interesting Times and Soucery as audio books and Colin Morgan's narration is absolutely BRILLIANT, which has made me slightly fonder of them than I was.
 
No, but Shakespeare was very anti-coal and made several damning allusions to it. Are you referring to one of his plays—or even Spenser?
I might be, yes. Unfortunately, I don't know. My admittedly vague memory is that it was a character written by a more modern author than either, though.
Possibly a garbled memory of the scene in the charming - and highly recommended- film Fairytale where the fleeing fairies encounter a column of cars bringing tourists to Cottingley? One of the intruders discards a cigarette end, and the little people recoil at its stink.

maximus otter
Definitely (well, as definite as I can be...) a book character, not a movie character. I shall try and check out the film you recommend, though, thank you. (And I really ought to try and visit the beck. I'm back in Yorkshire, now, after all).
 
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