It’s time to hang out in kind-of Australia?
Summary
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Into the Riverlands
The Bledlows of the Unseen University are doing their Ceremony of Keys while the Bursar and the Dean and the rest of the wizards are seeing to the Librarian, who is very ill. He’s lost control of his morphic function and keeps changing shape; the wizards half suspect that he’ll be dead soon. Rincewind is far away on the continent of XXXX (EcksEcksEcksEcks or FourEcks), digging a hole. A thousand miles from him, an opal miner named Strewth has just made a dangerous discovery that turns out to be alive. Ponder is having a hard time because he’s been using Hex to help him turn out invisible texts (of books that haven’t been written yet, or will be written elsewhere), and from that, Ridcully got the idea of “management” into his head and has been asking people what they do. (Also Ponder is currently obsessed with how similar most animals and their skeletons are.) He wakes at his desk one evening to find that the library is now attacking anyone who enters without the Librarian to keep the books in check. Ridcully declares that they must use magic to cure the Librarian, but Ponder points out a problem—in order to do that, they need to know the Librarian’s name, and no one does. Except… possibly Rincewind, who used to be Deputy Librarian at the time the Librarian became himself.
The wizards head to the Professor of Cruel and Unusual Geography to figure out how they can find Rincewind, since they can’t grab him back by magic given how that worked out last time. They can’t find him in his office, but assume he’s having a bath because they hear splashing behind a door. After going through books in the office and finding nothing particularly useful, Ridcully opens the door to what he assumes will be a bathroom and finds a tropical beach. Rincewind has been busying himself eating things that he doesn’t want to think much about and getting chased away by locals and making thong sandals from wood and creeper-woven twine. He has a journal he’s been keeping, and when he falls asleep, something erupts from the waterhole nearby and runs off. Death keeps Rincewind’s hourglass in his office because it’s such a mess, it’s as though Rincewind has backed through his own life in multiple directions and now his death is impossible to predict. He thinks that perhaps Rincewind is the eternal coward, meant to balance out the eternal hero. Noting where Rincewind has ended up, he decides to head to XXXX, assuming he’ll be needed before long.
The wizards are discussing how other wizards have used tiny black holes to jump from place to place like this and Ponder is mortified that he’s never heard of this before. They wonder if it possibly is XXXX on the other side of the door, and debate the merits of heading over and getting the Librarian (currently a book) out in the sun. They decide to head over, though Ridcully insists they are not doing this for a good time… and brings his crossbow in case he needs to hunt anything. Rincewind wakes up and a man is there who insists that he needs to feed the wizard up proper. He also insists that he’s not speaking Rincewind’s language, Rincewind is just hearing his. Then he vanishes, but he does leave a chicken sandwich behind. The wizards are at the beach and the Librarian is back to his old shape but feeling uneasy about it. But before he can put together what’s wrong with this place, he changes again. Rincewind is perplexed about why he’s suddenly finding food that’s familiar to him in the desert, but sets out toward the mountains and comes across a kangaroo who can talk. It’s about to hand him a quest so he starts to run away, but he’s headed in the right direction. The wizards realize they’re on an island and Mrs. Whitlow appears with snacks—unfortunately, she’s also closed the window they could leave through.
Rincewind has fallen into a waterhole and emerges in a cave. The kangaroo is there again, named Scrappy, and it shows him cave paintings that seem to show Rincewind. As the wizards argue about what to do about being stuck on the island, plants begin to grow. Scrappy tells Rincewind that space-time is weird here on the Last Continent because it was put together last and Rincewind arriving has changed things that have already happened. The wizards are noticing strange things about the island, like the fruits and leaves are offering up things like chocolate and cheese. Rincewind looks at the cave paintings and sees all the wizards and also his Luggage—Scrappy explains that they might be where he is, just not when he is. The kangaroo explains that Rincewind is going to save the place because he’s technically already done it. He’ll know he’s completed his task when it rains (which it never does on XXXX). Rincewind agrees to the quest, waits until the kangaroo seems to have disappeared and makes a run for it. But the fading kangaroo is grinning all the same.
Commentary
The thing is, Rincewind books are just weird, you know?
They’re not bad, that’s not what I’m saying, but what I mean is that most of Pratchett’s other Discworld novels are using framing devices that are familiar to readers via other venues. Watch books are based heavily in crime novels, and Witch books use fairy tales and theatre and Shakespeare, and Death books are dealing with bigger metaphysical questions. The one-offs are meant to tackle certain philosophical areas or rely heavily on place-and-time mechanics. We’ve got clear parameters on all of them that make those books easier to follow along with, because we’ve probably encountered their ilk before.
Rincewind books are kinda Pratchett taking all his favorite jokes and some concepts he wants to play with, and then going “how about I stick a weird quest in so he’s got stuff to be upset about?” with bonus points for constant wizard shenanigans. Like, just the general idea of let’s set the thing in Australia, only it’s fantasy Australia, which is kind of an oxymoron because do you know what’s IN Australia? Yeah, that’s where we’re going on this one. And then the time travel paradox schtick to keep things interesting.
That does mean that Rincewind books always take a while to gear up, as it were, so they’re a little harder to discuss as you go. You’ve got to spend time letting us know where the poor guy is at, and why he might be needed, and also what the hell the wizards are getting on with because there’s always something.
(I have an aside here about the fact that Pratchett started us off with this whole thing about wizards always killing each other to move up in ranks, and then having to finally acknowledge in this book that we’re going through a tranquil period in Unseen University history because he finally created an Archchancellor he enjoyed well enough to keep around indefinitely. Which I get because I wouldn’t ever want to get rid of Ridcully either, but it does make those initial books hilarious by virtue of this idea that the man installs himself and everyone’s like… well, sure, we can chill out for a bit.)
I do like the attention paid to details of Aboriginal art in this section, like noting the “x-ray painting” style and the hand outlines in ochre. I don’t much like all the mentions of spiders because, having lived in tropic areas where spiders are much bigger, I am fully aware of how horrifying they can be and please do not describe them to me. Please.
Asides and little thoughts:
- “Ridcully was to management what King Herod was to the Bethlehem Playgroup Association.” Okay just, WOW—
- As a kid who once went as Groucho Marx for Halloween, the idea of teaching Hex “Lydia the Tattooed Lady” is really sending me this week… but then the joke about Ridcully’s eyes “burning bright” at the mention of tigers sends me right back.
- I do love Rincewind being like “well, I saw the planet put together and this place didn’t come into it” and Scrappy being like “eh, there are way more gods messing around than the one you saw.” It’s a nice way to un-monotheism the narrative.
Pratchettisms:
All tribal myths are true, for a given value of “true.”
“That man really makes me want to swear,” said the Bursar.
Archchancellor Ridcully, into whose head that last sentence had treacherously arranged itself, realized that he was unconsciously drafting an obituary.
It was not the chilly, bleak silence of endless space, but the burning organic silence you get when, across a thousand miles of shimmering red horizons, everything is too tired to make a sound.
But, as the ear of observation panned across the desert, it picked up something like a chant, a reedy little litany that beat against the all-embracing silence like a fly bumping against the windowpane of the universe.
They say the heat and the flies here can drive a man insane. But you don’t have to believe that, and nor does that bright mauve elephant that just cycled past.
There were rooms containing rooms which, if you entered them, turned out to contain the room you’d started with, which can be a problem if you are in a conga line.
Next week we’re up to
“In your case, only by having a cold bath, Senior Wrangler.”
For the non Australians here, XXXX is the dominant beer in the northern state of Queensland. XXXX – how Queenslanders spell beer.
Pratchett has a mildly amusing but truly profound thought which you might miss since it’s on the first page. People don’t live on planets. “Planets may be the place where their body eats its tea, but they live elsewhere, in worlds of their own which orbit very handily around the center of their heads.”
Beyond that, after a string of serious (for a given value of serious) books, this is a Wizardly romp with added Rincewind.
The only remotely serious discussion is between the kangaroo and Rincewind about time and space which defies all logic.
Shoutback
The Creator brings to mind Slartibartfast, the continent designer, of H2G2.
Pratchettisms
The whole book, at this point. But here are some shorter ones that caught my eye.
“Grubs! That’s what we’re going to eat! That’s why they call it grub! And what are we doing to get the grub? Why we’re grubbing for it!” (Rincewind)
That only meant that it was more or less impossible to find whatever it was you were looking for, which is the purpose of computers. (Ponder Stibbons)
It tasted a little like chicken. When you are hungry enough practically anything can. (Rincewind)
The precise end of his life was now as hard to find as the starting point on a roll of really sticky transparent tape. (Death re Rincewind)
Creators aren’t gods. They make places, which is quite hard. It’s men that make gods. This explains a lot.
A wizard without a hat was just a sad man with a suspicious taste in clothes. (Rincewind)
There was activity around the window. It centered around a vision in pink, although admittedly the sort of vision associated with the more erratic kind of hallucinogen. (re Mrs. Whitlow)
The wizards were civilized men of considerable education and culture. When faced with being inadvertently marooned on a desert island they understood immediately that the first thing to do was to place the blame.
All we have to do is search this island until we find a book with a title like Practical Boat-Building for Beginners. (the Dean)
“Yes indeed,” he said. “I for one would not have thought of making all the snakes deadly and all the spiders deadlier than the snakes. And putting pockets on everything? Great idea.” (Rincewind)
For those not familiar with the real Ceremony of the Keys – this is a ceremony that’s been performed by the Yeoman Warders of the Tower of London (i.e. the Beefeaters) every night for the last 700 years. It starts at seven minutes to ten pm precisely (the time was set in the early 19th century; before that it was at sunset).
There was one occasion (just one) where it ran late; this was 29th December 1940 when a German bomb fell on the Tower and the blast blew the Chief Yeoman Warder off his feet, delaying the ceremony for a few minutes. He wrote a letter to the King apologising for the delay, and His Majesty graciously accepted the apology.
It occurs to me that after Jingo, one quote from Rincewind deserves mentioning.
“Rincewind had always been happy to think of himself as a racist. The One Hundred Meters, the Mile, the Marathon — he’d run them all. Later, when he’d learned with some surprise what the word actually meant, he’d been equally certain he wasn’t one. He was a person who divided the world quite simply into people who were trying to kill him and people who weren’t. That didn’t leave much room for fine details like what color anyone was.”
Pratchett did say he was running out of ways to keep Rincewind interesting. I guess his being the Eternal Coward wasn’t enough.
Ah, the last Rincewind novel, and probably the second best, after Interesting Times. I know he shows up a few more times but he’s never the main character again.
I have to admit, I have never been a Rincewnd fan. I’ve read the books. I don’t hate them, I don’t think I could hate any Pratchett book, but I never feel the need to read them again. Give me The Watch, The Witches, Death with or without Susan, or the stand alones. Rincewind I can take or leave.
@0: That does mean that Rincewind books always take a while to gear up. I was thinking this book was a slow starter and wondering if it was just me; this seems like a plausible explanation. We got Ankh-Morpork in bits and pieces as needed, but here Pratchett is introducing an entire continent.
I’m a bit annoyed that the window gets closed by the most sensible person — and the only woman — instead of some wizard forgetting where he came from, but people making “helpful” fatal errors is also a trope.
Pratchettisms:
“What sort of people would we be if we didn’t go into the Library?”<para>“Students,” answered the Senior Wrangler morosely. Seems like nobody is at UU for the ostensible reason.
The boundless silence made an eloquent statement about the universe’s views on clean underwear. cf the ~expired cliche about always wearing clean underwear “in case you’re in an accident”.
Tricksters have that robust sense of humor which puts a landmine under a seat cushion for a bit of a laugh.
A wizard who could wield a staff crackling with power against dreadful monsters from some ghastly region was nevertheless quite capable of picking up a feather duster by the wrong end and seriously injuring himself with it. Well, it’s an excuse…
“Whatever. We do not indulge in pranks.“<para>”With us, it’s a fully-fledged gold-embossed cockup, or nothing.” Either a nice bit of self-knowledge or an overgrown sense of their own ~abilities.
He did not intend to be found wanting when duty called. He did not intend to be found at all. For me this brings to mind the Duke of Plaza-Toro’s self-introduction (especially verse 2) in The Gondoliers — although Rincewind is frank rather than covering up about his cowardice.
As someone on reddit put it, some Discworld books have heart and deeper meaning and in others Pratchett just wanted to make a series of jokes. I do enjoy this particular series of jokes. Looking forward to Rincewind’s journey across the continent where he runs into every Aussie pop culture reference.
@1: The particular relevance here is that in the 1990s Castlemaine XXXX beer was being heavily marketed in the UK with a long-rumning series of TV ads showing characters in stereotypical outback locations and ending with the strapline “Australians wouldn’t give a Four-X for any other beer.” Pratchett’s British readers would have been very familiar with the beer and the joke. Ironically the XXXX we were drinking in Britain had never been anywhere near Australia – it was brewed under licence in the UK by an American company.
You mentioned something about the Rincewind books Not quite fitting into a particular genre, but I think for me anyway the point of them is to make the Discworld feel more like a world rather than just a few small cities or locations.
Rincewind isn’t tied to one particular place or Time so he can be used to explore the Discworld in more detail and
present a broader view of a particular place, before Pratchett revisits it in more detail.
I’ve wondered what inspired Pratchett to write a (pseudo-)Australia novel. One thought I had was that he thought, “How can I get a vacation to be a tax deduction? I know, I’ll call it research! Great! Off to Alice Springs on the next flight!”
Of course, that would require the tax laws to be like American tax laws concerning deductions, and I know nothing about that.
@12
My understanding/memory is that it was the other way round. He had done a book signing tour in Australia and wrote The Last Continent subsequently. Later on in the book we get references to meat pie floaters and vegemite, neither of which were or are particularly well-known of in the UK and which he presumably discovered during that tour.
@13.
Pterry did do a tour in the early nineties which included time in the Outback and a visit to Uluru.
He was very generous with his time and agreed to have dinner with fans from the Pratchett message boards (rec.arts…) before doing a TV chat show. He regaled us with stories and anecdotes about the books and we shared Stories and slang. He was full of mischief and joy describing telling American tourists that there was a kiosk on top of Uluru….
I like to think the book started taking shape on that trip.