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Hogfather by Terry Pratchett
28 Plays1 month ago
Mandy is joined by Erika to discuss Hogfather by Terry Pratchett. Join us for a discussion of the Chirstmas, err, Hogswatch spirit as well as Death, Academia, and the small lies that hold society together. Happy Hogswatch!
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Transcript
Introduction to Mandemonium Podcast
00:00:10
Speaker
Welcome to Mandemonium, a podcast where I, your host, Mandy, talk to guests about their favorite works of fiction, whether that be books, movies, TV shows, or more.
Discussion on 'Hogfather' by Terry Pratchett
00:00:20
Speaker
Today I have on Erika to discuss the book Hogfather by Terry Pratchett.
00:00:33
Speaker
Editor's note, I know we missed the November episode. My entire family was sick and there was travel and things just didn't work out. So the promised November episode will be released in January instead. I still wanted to release my December episode on time since it is in theme for the holidays. ah Thank you for your patience. Welcome, Erica. This is your first time on the podcast. And today we are discussing Hogfather by Terry Pratchett.
00:01:02
Speaker
Uh, so as everyone who comes on this podcast, I let you pick, uh, the topic. It just so happened that the book you picked was in the Christmas season allegorically. No, that's not the right word. Metaphorically in the Christmas season, it worked well for our December podcast. So Erica, ah Terry Pratchett, you're a huge fan.
Philosophical Themes in Hogfather
00:01:22
Speaker
So why don't we first talk about why Terry Pratchett? Uh, and then we can talk specifically about why hog father. So why Terry Pratchett?
00:01:31
Speaker
um i Terry Pratchett, first of all, I don't know how Americans aren't necessarily familiar, but he's he wrote like he's written dozens and dozens of books. There there are over 40 books in the Discworld series alone. um Extremely popularly popular in England and did the Good Omens with Neil Gaiman, which I think he's the thing he's most famous for in the US. But hugely popular in England. And he's my favorite author. it he's um had a he has a very eclectic approach to everything and is pretty much interested in everything and even though his books are a satire and very very funny and very silly in some ways they are also fairly they have some fairly deep philosophical themes running through them um specifically hog father which is you know sort of a send up of a it's a it's a parody hall of all of the christmas christmas myth making and sort of winter solstice myth making
00:02:29
Speaker
It's got one of my my one of the passages, I think, that that really sort of informs atheist morality in the sense that it talks about, in the universe as a whole, there is no absolute justice or absolute mercy. But humans have to believe in these things for humanity to work. And that that's always struck me as really profound. And that's why this one ranks as one of my favorites. Excellent.
Terry Pratchett's Discworld and Its Satire
00:02:56
Speaker
Discworld. So it's a fantasy.
00:02:58
Speaker
series. i Kind of fantasy, like you said, parody, but for anyone who has not read Discworld, I know one of the things you've warned me off of is starting it in chronological order. Yes. um the The first couple of books in the in the series, Color of Magic, specifically, they're there if you were involved in fantasy literature in the 1980s, they are hilariously funny and kind of cringe.
00:03:25
Speaker
And if you weren't involved heavily in fantasy literature from the 1980s, they're just appalling. But he sort of developed the Discworld as he went along through all 40 books of it. and And so now it's this a fairly realized universe within within its own rules. But it's the Discworld is in fact a disc um being born through space on the backs of four elephants on the back of a giant turtle, which obviously there's there's tons of myth myths that reference something along those lines.
00:03:55
Speaker
um And it's got, magic is a very prominent feature of this world, but it doesn't necessarily work like say magic in the Game of Thrones or in a lot of other series. And fundamentally, like like any good parodist, it's basically poking fun at society in general, human society in general. Yeah, a lot of poking fun at academia in this one.
Academic Satire in Discworld
00:04:19
Speaker
Yeah, this one involves the, it's it's a There are several threads ah in the Discworld universe, and one the two of them actually are are the books about death, which, considering that death is the main character, us are generally fairly heartwarming and uplifting, which is ah kind of an odd way to go about it. And um the Wizards of the Unseen University, which is at once a parody of a lot of fantasy literature combined with really just savaging British academic culture. Yeah.
Can 'Hogfather' Stand Alone?
00:04:51
Speaker
Probably not just British culture. Yeah. That's a lot of comments. Academia is academia is academia. a ah So do you think that people could just read this book? This is one of the ones that I, it's not one of the ones that I usually try and recommend as a gateway drug. um And I do yeah quite frequently, but it could be read as a standalone. There's a lot of the jokes that you'll understand a lot more of.
00:05:21
Speaker
if you if you recognize the characters from other series as they crop up. but Yeah, and and I'll say I've only read a ah handful of Discworld books and I'd not read any of the death books. i And I didn't find it hard to understand the world in this book. So I think while probably not the one that you normally recommend, I think it's guards, guards. I usually start with Men in Arms or a book called Small Gods.
00:05:50
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. I've, I've read minute arms and guards guards, I think. And then I've read all the Tiffany aching ones, which can be read as a subset because they were written for kids. Uh, which, I mean, I say that, but they're written in the Terry Pratchett style. It's not like he dumbed them down. It's just that the protagonist is like. Okay. Yeah. yeah no there's I can't, I can't think of anything in the Discworld series that I would not, ah that I would try and keep a young kid from reading.
00:06:20
Speaker
as long as they could actually understand what was going on. Yeah, so I would actually say, well, how old were you when you first got into Discworld, Erica? 18, but that's just because I'm old. And that's when they started coming over to the States. I would actually probably recommend them for voracious readers of younger age, right? i Yeah. And I think I would like them better if I had read them in middle school. Really?
00:06:49
Speaker
the Tiffany Akins or all of them. Terry Pratchett is not really my style. Like I really struggle reading them, but I i could tolerate a lot more different writing styles in middle schools. What about it mean it made you ah hard made it made it hard going for you?
Terry Pratchett's Writing Style
00:07:08
Speaker
ah so but see this is not This is supposed to be talking about our favorite things, but I don't want to like savage somebody and no it don't have anything against Terry Pratchett. It'll be fine.
00:07:18
Speaker
this is gonna sound terrible. It's shallow, not the themes, but like ah you're never like really in a character's head, right? Like, and there's like pages of just conversation between characters, like just conversation. and and And I don't mean like people are talking and like doing stuff, like they are literally just words on the page of people saying like, and Erica said, and Mandy said, and Erica said, and Mandy said, and I'm like, oh my God, I don't care about this entire conversation.
00:07:46
Speaker
between people I hate. So because in in this one, I particularly didn't like the thieves, right? Like, I found every scene with them like taxing. um Okay. So, but obviously they're necessary to the plot, like their major plot device. And I loved how the booklet came together in the end, which we'll talk about when we open up to spoilers. But right, it's not that his themes are shallow. It's that the writing is like, very like, high level, I guess. And like, I mean, I couldn't make it through good omens. I don't like Neil Gaiman. I don't, not, I mean, I was gonna say not as a person, but I guess, no, I'll just say that. No, no, no. I don't know anything about Neil Gaiman as a person. I don't know anything about what I read online. But like, I don't like his books. And I enjoyed Tiffany Aiken, but all the other ones I've read, I've struggled with just to like get through them. They're just not my style. Like they're, they're very well written, but not everything appeals to
00:08:45
Speaker
everybody, right? Correct. Yeah, no, no, no. I thought it was very well done. Cratchit fans are are known as being the Jehovah's Witnesses of the of fandom. and yeah After a while, your friends to learn to stop asking you for a book recommendations. Yeah, I think there's also like this thing where books have to come to you at the right place in your life. like I'm sure eventually I'll have Trevor on to talk about the Bulgaria He loves the Bulgaria. I have other friends who love the Bulgaria. I like the Bulgaria. The difference is I didn't read it in middle school. Yeah, I tried to read the Bulgaria as an adult, but I'm like, at it did it's it's like it's it's a great middle school book. And I imagine it's a lot like people who come to Harry Potter as an adult or
Belief and Societal Norms in Hogfather
00:09:30
Speaker
Percy Jackson. Right. Like it just, you know, you've got to have it at the right place in your life for a book to
00:09:37
Speaker
ah to work or speak to you. like i think like I love Asimov because I read him in middle school. like I think if you gave me an Asimov book for the first time right now, I would burn it to the ground and be like, this book is terrible. ah But because there's so much nostalgia wrapped up in Asimov for me, and I love the ideas, like I can make it through a book that's all conversation and you're female characters. I have not dared to go back in June. June ate my adolescence. And I just haven't looked because I know. i'm just it's I can't look at that as an adult.
00:10:09
Speaker
and Yeah, so like there are books that we love ah that I think need to come to us at different times. But I think Terry Pratchett is very approachable. I think that like for fans who aren't like deep fantasy fans, like, ah which I mean, it's a parody of fantasy. So you can obviously enjoy it if you enjoy fantasy. But like, the reading level is not like a 12th grade reading level, right? Like it's still got deep themes.
00:10:36
Speaker
It's gonna come to a nice conclusion in the end where all these different storylines wrap up, and there's legitimately funny moments. So I think it has something for everyone. It's it's just not my preferred style of writing, I guess. Which, you know, I say the same thing about Jane Austen. So this is not like a like Terry Pratchett is a bad writer. like i Jane Austen's just not my style of writing. I have a hard time getting into it. Weirdly, I can listen to Austen better. I feel like it works better as an audio.
00:11:06
Speaker
the ah The other thing, the thing about the Discworld spanning 40 novels too, is that there is an extremely wide range.
Plot and Characters of 'Hogfather'
00:11:12
Speaker
um yeah I picked this one specifically because of the the the the part we'll talk about, about the, you know, what what justice and mercy in the universe. But there's um ah like a Night Watch, which actually is going to come out as a penguin edition next year. um That deals a lot in, you know, dealing with police and the role of police in society.
00:11:32
Speaker
And there's still ridiculous jokes, too, which is why I think a lot of people can't take Pratchett seriously, because he he never shies away from um unsophisticated humor. But the jokes are what make it fun. Yeah. full of sugar that we're And if you can't poke fun, like, whatever you've been doing, you know, right like, can can you truly like, I mean, going back to that, like a cop book and criticizing kind of like,
00:11:58
Speaker
justice system. Like can you truly like criticize the system if you're not poking fun at it and uh you know mixing together like the serious like good cops with like the ridiculous ones with the bad ones like because not everyone's a bad person some of them are just ridiculous like all of academia in this book. Right. All right so we'll open it up to uh spoilers now so we can talk about some of the particular ridiculousness uh but there's essentially three four main character thrusts, like arcs that we have to follow, right? So there's the academia, there's Susan, there's death, and then there's the thieves. right And there's some little ones that pop up and disappear, but those are, I would say, the main ones. So we've already talked about academia a little bit, aye but these are the university wizards, the unseen university, and they think they're highfalutin. Yes.
00:12:53
Speaker
there's a lot of stuff of of sort of There's a lot of stuff that comes up in all throughout the Discworld series about sort of the difference between academic magic, which is very much the wizards, and it's got all the ridiculous petty infighting and, frankly, not viewing being very useful. And the witches, like as you saw in the Tiffany Aking books, with the very serious hands-on caring of the community. and So having read Tiffany Aking first, right like you know they definitely had opinions about wizards. And it's it's interesting, because when you I mean,
00:13:24
Speaker
When you look at that kind of dichotomy, it's like the wizards are, academia is incredibly male dominated. Like there are no girls, right, at the university. And then the witches are obviously women, female oriented. And so you kind of get this split between like the men with their like high and mighty like high up views and the women who are like down in the dirt actually like healing people and helping them birth their pigs and stuff, which is not unrealistic.
00:13:52
Speaker
Yeah, there's a little bit of process. I think there's ah there's a male witch in the the later Tiffany aching. and ah And one of the earlier books actually deals with a ah a girl who is the seventh daughter or the eighth daughter of the eighth son and accidentally gets handed the wizard's staff at birth. But that's also one of the earlier ones. Again, and so it's one of the ones where you're like, make sure you actually like Pratchett before you go back that far. Yeah, yeah. um So the wizards have this weird plot line where they open a bathroom.
00:14:22
Speaker
And that kind of kicks everything off for them. But really, they're just kind of experiencing the side effects of everything happening, I would say. And where's the the part where, yeah, did they ah they that they they're sort of there to explain to the main characters what actually is happening with the existence of belief. Because the now the they're the the plot being, of course, that Tia Time has been commissioned by the auditors. There's a guild of assassins.
00:14:51
Speaker
in encor work and they they've been commissioned to kill the Hogfather because if you the auditors hate all the messiness that comes with human belief. and And the Hogfather is Santa Claus if you're listening to this and didn't read the book. Yes, did the Hogfather is Santa Claus. Everything to do with the Hogfather is is basically a sign up of either Santa Claus or some of the older a creepier winter solstice myths.
00:15:18
Speaker
um And so that they're they're going to kill the hogfather. And the the wizards are basically there to explain what's going on. And of course, to then bring in the the the hex, which is their ant hill computer. Ant hill inside? Because puns. Yeah, they're they're and and to be fair, a lot of the comic relief too. Yeah, I guess backing up, I just dove into the wizards. But yeah the auditors have hired the assassins to kill the hogfather.
00:15:48
Speaker
One of the interesting constructions of this book is that ah kind of most of the plot lines start with the Hogfather already being dead, but you, the reader, kind of don't realize that till towards the end. um So everybody's kind of dealing with like this excess of belief, I guess, that's this fallout of killing a major mythical figure right before Christmas or Hogfather.
00:16:16
Speaker
Hogs, which fans actually will send each other Hogs watch cards. Uh, but, uh, the, so the thieves plot line is kind of in a different parts of it are in a different timeline than say, Susan's or deaths or the wizards who are all kind of happening and at the same time. Um, because the auditors hired this tea time guy, it's not pronounced tea time, but teaton He has a plan to how to kill the hog father, which we don't discover how he did it, uh, until the very end. But because he killed the hog father, there's now like an excess of belief. Uh, and the university wizards particularly are dealing with these like ridiculous little gods appearing, I guess. Uh, yeah, like the wort gnome, the wort gnome and, uh, the Oh God of hangovers and the God of indigestion.
00:17:13
Speaker
Uh, and the, uh, that like good manners fairy or the cheerful fairy, the cheerful fairy who basically is so miserable all the time that everyone head around her tries to get more cheerful to to make her happy. Yes. Uh, so all these, uh, fairies keep a feeling. I will say that the way the book was constructed, I thought the opening of the bathroom was causing the gods to appear. Oh, right. That that was the side effect. Cause the bathroom was like,
00:17:40
Speaker
do not open under any circumstances. And then they open it, and then suddenly all these random little gods are appearing. Oh, the bathroom causes i anything you say to come true. But that's not the case. i It's an excess of belief. And suddenly all
Death and Tradition in 'Hogfather'
00:18:00
Speaker
the kids are like, I really know that it's your parents who give you presents. Right. So then the death comes in because death wants to restore the hog father.
00:18:09
Speaker
or and restore the nature of human beliefs. So he goes around pretending to be the hog father, doing all the things like having sooty little footprints from the the the across from the from the chimney to the hogs watch tree and drinking thena the the sherry that has been left out for the hog. but This is all going to sound really all or ought to sound really familiar. um And showing up- We got sherry and like pork pies. We just got Santa milk and cookies. like right and turnip speed up sustaining And turnips for the boars that are pulling the slave full of toys. flying pick and The And he turns up as a as a mall Santa. I loved that. So I loved all the death sequences and I loved the mall Santa sequence of just like the kids asking for things and the parents trying to be like, no, he really needs to get this because
00:19:05
Speaker
That's what they already got him. And then the store manager like freaking out. Cause he's like, you can't just give stuff away in a store. but Death's not stealing the stuff. He's like pulling it out of the bag and giving it to the kids. So he's not doing anything wrong. So the cops get called and the cops are like, you want us to arrest the hogs. Watch in the middle of the mall. on ah definite look How's that going to look? Gonna have a riot in front of these children. I don't know. I saw the Santa Claus. Okay. They do arrest Santa Claus on Christmas night. I've actually never seen that movie. It's,
00:19:34
Speaker
actually pretty good but uh the first one don't watch any you know okay but the the and actually the cops that show up um corporal knobs and visit the infidel with explanatory pamphlets um uh they they actually are part of it the they're part of the other uh so one of the other pratchett threads uh which is the the watch the city watchbooks uh which is the the one i was talking about that talks about policing but knobs corporal knobs isn't one of the um humorous characters, as is obviously the definitely definitely not Jehovah's Witness guy. I think it's appropriate having the guy who doesn't celebrate Hogs Watch work on Hogs Watch, because he's not missing anything, right? Right. like
Susan's Role in 'Hogfather'
00:20:13
Speaker
Seems reasonable. Yeah. So death is also a God, like the Hogfather. Well, he's not really a God. He's just death. I, but I, sure. hope of god
00:20:28
Speaker
He follows the same rules, right? Because T-Times asks at the beginning if he even has a plan to kill death. And he's like, yeah, it's like he could probably have followed the same rules ah to kill death, which would be weird. Then Susan would probably just become death. Because Susan is death's granddaughter, sort of. Right. In one of the earlier books, that death adopted a daughter um and took an apprentice because death is trying, it helps to think of death as extremely autistic and trying to imitate humans.
00:20:59
Speaker
because he tries all these things and they're all sort of vaguely off but they are well meant and from the heart. um Susan i i don't I don't remember if it's in this book or not but she describes that he at his head in his realm when she came to visit as a child he set up a tree for her or tree swing for her which tied to the the the ropes to opposite branches on the trunk opposite branches across the trunk and then just cut the trunk out of the middle. And of course the branches stayed up because this is death's throne and the real world world world's know world real world world rules don't work. um sorry ah But yes, the death adopted a daughter and got an apprentice in an earlier book. And of course the daughter and the apprentice fell in love and there were shenanigans. But the death's daughter and her the apprentice went out to the world to live as real humans. The Duke and Duchess would still heal it.
00:21:52
Speaker
which is another country and in this in this world, and they had a daughter, and they tried to raise their daughter like like like Ada Lovelace's mom tried and got her good daughter into math because it was the opposite of poetry, since she didn't want Ada turning out like her father, Lord Byron. So the Susan's parents gave her a desperately rational upbringing. But because that's how genetic genetics done,
00:22:18
Speaker
there's magic involved and the the can convention magical genetics to finally start coming through and and so Susan starts to have her own adventures as death's granddaughter where some of the rules don't really apply to her and she's sort of trying to find her way in her identity. um Her parents have in fact passed away. she used the debt Susan is the Duchess of Stowelet but she's working as a governor's because she's going to you know be a serious person who makes her own way in the world.
00:22:43
Speaker
Yeah, but the children all i have like these imaginary monsters who come after them, but they're real, kind of, and Susan's able to fight them off. But none of the other adults can see them. Right, because the children believe in the monsters, so right the monsters become real. And so so Susan is is known in the undead community as being somewhat of a bane of all the boogeymen in the city. Yeah, and I did think, you know pulling up the boogeyman thread, I did think it was interesting that the Tooth Fairy was a boogeyman. Yeah.
00:23:13
Speaker
So it's like ah but the first boogeyman who basically got tired of scaring children and wanted to, you know, and that's like a question throughout the whole book is like, what did the tooth fairy do with all these teeth? And the answer is like nothing. This stores them, but there's the old idea of magic that you can store some, you can, you can control someone if you have some, you know, if you have a piece of their hair, if you have a fingernail or if you have a tooth. Right. Yeah. I thought that was really interesting that there is no, like, there was no inherent tooth fairy and the tooth fairy kind of like,
00:23:42
Speaker
was a boogeyman who like created that, like created the Tooth Fairy myth because they were tired of being scaring children. So instead they were just like, yeah, I started leaving money for tea. So yeah, Susan ah realizes death is ah impersonating the hog father and she thinks he's just being weird, I guess.
00:24:04
Speaker
he's gone yet Yes. Uh, so she's trying to like track down what's actually going on and, uh, you know, where the real hog father is. And then she discovers the hog father is dead, but she still doesn't understand death's plan, which is ultimately, uh, at the, like the very clearly at the beginning from death's perspective, you know what, that what he's doing is doing the hog father myth to keep it alive. So people will still believe in the hog father. So the hog father can come back. Uh, but Susan doesn't have even a fraction of the picture because death told her like nothing. It would be against the rules for death to interfere in in the human world. So he just told Susan, there's nothing going on, nothing to see here. Don't worry your head about it, which of course meant that Susan then it promptly started investigating everything. Which is what he wanted. Yes. Yes. Because he does need her in the end because he needs a human to help the hog father.
00:25:01
Speaker
definite One of the
Power of Belief in Discworld
00:25:03
Speaker
things that shows up a lot in the Discworld is the idea of belief having power. And it's the theme of one of the other books is is about how God's sort of the one of the the big themes in one of the other books is that the the people have stopped believing in the God and just believing of the structure of the God's church. And so the God is reduced to basically a turtle and has to kind of get back into where people actually believe in him and not just the structure he created.
00:25:30
Speaker
So people have to believe in the Hogfather. If they believe in the Hogfather, the Hogfather will come back to life. And the whole purpose of stealing all these teeth and stealing the teeth teeth from the Tooth Fairy is T-Time's way of trying to kill the Hogfather. Because if you can control the children's belief, they won't believe in him, and then he will die. Yes. And he has everyone's teeth. So that includes people who have grown up, right? So that's also why the adults, some of them, don't believe who might have believed before.
00:25:59
Speaker
i i I also, I feel like there's an overlap here where you can clearly see how Terry Pratchett influenced Neil Gaiman. Cause I feel like with this gods kind of discussion, there's a huge overlap with American gods. It's just putting it in America versus a parody universe. right But obviously they were friends and they talked and aye it's just, a Terry Pratchett is able to do more ridiculous things with it because it's in a second-world fantasy, right? That's a ah parody. Whereas Neil Gaiman attempts to take it like very seriously. Neil Gaiman takes everything very seriously. Yes, I also did not like American Gods. But that's not because of what it was about. It was because the main character is so passive. But once again, that's on purpose. It's an authorial choice. I just don't enjoy it.
00:26:54
Speaker
um But ah so, yeah, they're trying to restore all the belief. ah Death. So the the known side, no, death sidekick. What is he? Alfred. Alfred, is he always with death? Yes, he's death. He again is an earlier book. um He was a wizard at the unse Unseen University. There's a statue of him at the Unseen. He shows up in a book and it's sort of hilarious because all the wizards went and pissed on the statue of this guy when they were young students at the university.
00:27:25
Speaker
It was like a university ritual and suddenly the guy shows up and everyone's horribly embarrassed. But he used to be a wizard at the Unseen University and he tried summoning death and it didn't work. hes He got summoned to death. yeah And so now he kind of exists as as death's the servant. kind of I mean, not just servant, but um ah assistant and man of all work and he helps out in the in death's realm and maintaining everything there.
00:27:55
Speaker
Yeah, so I guess that was my only point of logical confusion is does this guy not count as human and could he not do the things that death needed Susan to do? ah He is almost out of time. Okay. He can't, he, because he's in in the little hog
Character of Death in Fiction
00:28:09
Speaker
father bubble, he gets to continue existing, but there's only a few grains left in his life timer. And so if he went out as a human, he would die. Okay. That makes sense. That makes sense. That's just not in this book, but that's fine. Cause it's I think it's referenced once, but if you didn't know what it was referring to, you might, you would miss it. So also there was the reference to the little match girl story in the middle of this. I love that one so much because trying to explain it to death and you're like, no, it's just horrible. It's just terrible. For God's sake, get the girl a meal. It's like, but it's beautiful. The angels come and he's like, Oh, they save her. No, no. Like, uh, she dies.
00:28:53
Speaker
What's the best person someone can get a future? Yeah. Yeah. Which is funny cause death is death. Like he should reap her, right? He's her life timer goes up and he should go kill her. That's his job. And that's when, uh, him not reaping the little match girl is what knocks Susan even further to death. Right. Uh, cause if death stops doing this job, then Susan becomes death. I guess.
00:29:19
Speaker
destroyer world. So I really enjoyed Susan and Death. I really liked them. So Susan is doing all this other random stuff and she comes across the Oh God of hangovers who maybe survives the end of the book. Unclear. it really is I mean, they they end up in the, in the tooth fairies realm. One of the, you know, when, when when the, when the banjo takes over is the tooth fairy. But yeah, I know that it's it's not clear whether he'll still be there in that realm. Yeah. And he's like,
00:29:47
Speaker
kind of infatuated with that little tooth fairy girl who apparently took all the teeth out of some kid's head at some point. Yeah. No, clear. They gave her pliers. His head was under the pillow. So she took all the teeth. I also thought it was interesting that like the tooth fairies have no idea where the teeth goes, right? They just right collect
Tea Time's Character Analysis
00:30:06
Speaker
it. But they've never actually been to the tooth fairy realm. But the thieves break in, they go to the tooth fairy realm, they steal all the teeth, and then they end up getting like hunted by their own nightmares from childhood.
00:30:17
Speaker
Yeah, because they're in their they're they're in essentially what's a child's painting realm where it's it's described as always very creepy because this sky the sky is just directly above you and it's primary color blue. And the the ground is always below you and it's always a bright, bright green because it's like a child's crayon drawing. And ah yeah, the the I love the German bringing up the German scissors myth. That one's great. um Kids who suck their thumbs get chased by a gigantic pair of scissors to snip their thumbs off.
00:30:47
Speaker
which is just so astonishingly tatonic. And then they might kill you in the tooth fairy realm if you're a full grown man. so you know right But you can't die in the tooth fairy realm. So your body just appears in the real world. ah And like people are like, there's a dead body here now. But it's not more pork. So no one's the ever, that's not that unusual. Yeah, except in the wizard's revived tea time, which is dumb. She's loving to be dead. Right. But they didn't know.
00:31:15
Speaker
No, they didn't. But I thought it was interesting, too, how all the the kids clock T-Time right away is as ah someone who is seriously, seriously wrong. Yeah. And and you we we talk about T-Time as an assassin, but like the Guild of Assassins doesn't even like him, because the Guild of Assassins views themselves as having like a moral code. And T-Time, I guess, is outside of that, because he'll just kill anyone. And you see that multiple times, where he'll like tell someone, like do this thing for us and I won't kill you. And they do it for him, and then he just kills him.
00:31:43
Speaker
yeah There's a line at the beginning about the head of the Assassin's Guild. you know We took him in because he was an orphan, and in retrospect, we should have wondered about that. Yes. Implication. He killed his parents. Yeah. Tea time is a little messed up, but he likes Banjo, because Banjo does whatever he says. Yeah. And Banjo is how they get the they kidnap the Tooth Fairy, because he's ah he's not wooden. He's childlike. And so he still believes in the Tooth Fairy, and so they even though he's and a fully grown man and very, very, fairly terrifying by everyone's description. um when When they knock out one of his teeth and put it under his pillow, the Tooth Fairy has to come because he still believes in the Tooth Fairy. Right. Which is, you know, one of those threads which you don't really realize towards the end, right? Because at the beginning, it's like tea time meets with all these guys and then he punches Banjo. And that's the end of the scene. And then like several pages later, it just skips forward to they're all working together and you're like, I don't understand why this happened. I mean, Terry Pratchett is doing that purposefully, right? He doesn't want to reveal the plan.
00:32:41
Speaker
I will say a couple of the early scenes like that that were extremely disjointed made it hard for me to start the book because I was like, did I miss a section? Like I literally was like flipping back. Like, did I skip pages? Like did pages not get included in this book? But it was purposeful. And it's interesting that you point that out. I read that for the first time when this came out in 1996, so long ago, that I completely, I would not have got that at all now. Yeah.
00:33:07
Speaker
Yeah, it's just because there's so he's introducing so many characters at the beginning with so many like snippets of scenes. And then he doesn't want you to know what's going on with Tea Time. But you spend so much of the beginning with Tea Time, and then it's like you drop them. And then he comes back, and it's like you missed like time. Which you did. You did miss time. And he wants to reveal it in the end. But it was just a little bit jarring. But I
Societal Norms and Belief Systems in Hogfather
00:33:31
Speaker
think that the interesting thing about Tea Time is that, of course, he he does break all those social contracts. like All the things that you're expecting If you don't, if you do this for me, I won't kill you. Well, and then he kills you. And there's no, you know, there's no overarching part of the universe that says he has to keep to that code and he doesn't. And that's what makes him so wrong in basically the eyes of everybody that everyone, nobody likes this guy. He puts everybody wrong. I mean, obviously he's a murderer. That's not helping, but like he doesn't, he does not, he is what you get if you don't have any of the sort of, any of this underlying belief in what you were supposed to do as a human.
00:34:06
Speaker
Right. Right. So it all ties back to those themes you're talking about, um, of, you know, the small beliefs that lead to the big beliefs. Cause tea time doesn't have any of those beliefs. He just wants to kill the hog father. Cause this is an interesting challenge. Right. And he is just, he's, it's sort of like, and I guess the, um, and this is going to seem like the strangest comparison, but, um, uh, Anton, uh, I sugar is how you say that last name from no, kind no country for old men.
00:34:36
Speaker
Um, the Cormac McCarthy, he's another carriage. Well, he actually, he's not even like that, but it's the same sort of pitiless, like this is just how it's going to be. Although it actually trigger actually does live up to the code that he sets for himself. So yeah, he, he just, he does not, he does not at any point follow any human conventions and to everyone in the book, that's incredibly off-putting. Right. Because everybody in the book, right. It's like.
00:35:01
Speaker
British society on steroids. So it's like propriety and, you know, right unspoken rules that dictate their society. So they might be assassins, but, you know, I think at the beginning the head assassin guy is like, we don't kill the help, right? Like, why would you like, unless they like got directly in the way, but T time like killed the help on his last job for like no reason and the dogs. Yeah.
00:35:27
Speaker
And it's like, no, no, the, the assassins are like, no, we we take it as a point of pride that we can sneak in and the help won't even see us. Right. So they're going to do things the more difficult way to not hurt anybody else. Uh, because it's, it's not, it's morals, but it's like, it's like, uh, look how good I am. Right. Nobody even noticed I was here. I was just able to kill the Mark. Whereas he times like, well, it's just more efficient to kill everybody on the way in. Right.
00:35:54
Speaker
You know, it's bad form. it's It's worse than bad. It's bad form. Yes. So i that that's a very ah British thing, I feel like. Yes. Not that we don't have it here, but in America, we can't even get people to return shopping carts. So, you know, the most basic of social contracts. One of my, one of my actual, the, there's the parody scene. that That's one of my, one of my favorites is that it's sort of talking about sort of the popular what Christmas is supposed to be about versus what it kind of is in the popular Imagine. It's the scene with the Wizards when they're all talking and they're all um talking about basically every horrible family holiday you've ever had when no one's speaking to each other. Yes. And everybody's being petty and bitchy about everything. And but then the the sort of the the oh the arch chancellor of the university who is a character not known for his sensitivity or subtlety.
00:36:47
Speaker
and sitting there thinking about how much he loves the holiday and the good food and seeing all the relatives and know and whenever he gets a hogs watch card, definitely not a Christmas card. He you know he sits and thinks ah a nice thought about this person who sent him this note and you know sort of what it's supposed to be versus what it kind of tends to be. and Yeah, and I love the line where they were talking about like, and some punk kid comes and beats you at the game. And he's like, wait, was that me? Did you identify that one with that one, Mandy?
00:37:16
Speaker
I, people don't like it when I beat them games, especially when you're a child and you beat much older people at games. My uncle once cheated at Clue so that he could beat me. He cheated at Clue. Like, he changed the cards in the, that
00:37:43
Speaker
yeah. Yeah. Otherwise I was, cause i will I won otherwise, but then he was like, oh, the cards don't say that. And I'm just like, then someone's lying. Like you can't, how would you the cheat a clue? Like family members. Uh, so yeah, I did appreciate that. Like there's this ideal of what Christmas and you know, Thanksgiving for Americans, British people don't have Thanksgiving, I guess is like, and, uh, somehow, uh, it never quite ends up like that. Reality tends to fall short.
00:38:15
Speaker
Yeah, especially at the bigger the gathering, right? Like the more people you have, the more dramatic it can be. The older the grudges. Yes. The older the attendees, the older the grudges too. Right. So when your grandparents, siblings show up, that's when the real drama. that's when the that's when the That's when all the gossip comes out. Yeah. But it's interesting because the wizards, like and now they don't go home for Hogs Watch. They just celebrate.
00:38:44
Speaker
at the university and like women aren't invited, I guess. They have a big feast. Yes. That's pretty much what they're known for is is big feasts and huge dinners and ah getting getting in the way of the wizards and their food is ah is a bad idea. So they spend most of their time doing pet petty academic infighting and fancy food. And as a result, they don't destroy the world with magic. That's probably what you want. Just keep them distracted. Although, I mean, in the goodness of the great things It creeps in too. I think there's that little discussion of the unreal estate where all the magical, ah the the magical basically superfund site is. And people trying to live there and they're the the the wizards being, oh, it'll be fine in 50,000 years or so. I also liked the poking funded academia where like the arch chancellor and the dean and the kids trying to explain the computer. And they're like, I should just say it's magic so that like he doesn't ask questions because he's never going to understand.
00:39:41
Speaker
And it's like, I feel like everyone in academia has felt that at some point where it's like, you know more than the professor, ah but the professor is the professor. Which isn't to say that professors in
Human Beliefs vs. Scientific Perspectives
00:39:55
Speaker
academia are dumb, but sometimes they're just very in their niche and they've been teaching the same class for a hundred years. And you did something that brought in stuff from other classes and that's confusing to them. And it's new. They're not so much dumb as high bound. Yes. Yes.
00:40:11
Speaker
So I thought that was funny. And I did like Hex, the computer. Right. They get honey in the summer from it because, you know, the bees just do whatever they want. It's an anthill and a beehive. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The thing that always has gotten me about this book is the the discussion of, of you you know, like there's some sort of dichotomy between understanding the world and and and human belief and that that the idea of ah of a scientific view of the world, the sort of cold view of of how everything works and how everything moves together and how that's incompatible with sort of the more poetic belief of the you know the the the world and the difference between, I guess the the thing that keeps coming up is the difference between the sun coming up and the the star illuminating the the world the next day. Because that's telling Susan, if you don't do this, the sun won't come up.
00:41:07
Speaker
And in the literal sense, the landscape would have been illuminated by a ball of flame, but it wouldn't have had the same poetic sense that there wouldn't be the same sense of of um belief in that there being more than just the physical aspect of the universe. um And the idea that that that human belief in things that aren't true is actually really, really important because human society basically functions on belief and stuff that isn't true.
00:41:36
Speaker
that when you say you're not going to kill someone when they help you, you don't kill them. Right. Even though there's no reason not to, that you're just bound by your word, right? Right. There isn't any justice in the universe. we you know there There could be a supernova on its way to kill us all right now. there That wouldn't be fair. It wouldn't be merciful. It's just the way the universe is. But humanity stands here and says that you know what we're going to have, in in this little small place where we live, we're going to have justice. And we're going to try to be merciful.
00:42:05
Speaker
And I mean, none of this is perfect. It's it's never going to be perfect. yeah I don't think it can be perfect if humans are involved. But we keep trying to do this. And it's important to hold these things, not because they're immutable truths of the universe, because they're not, but because they're something that that humans have created that is really great and profound. And so we have to hold to them and
Social Commentary in 'Hogfather'
00:42:29
Speaker
try and keep making them better. Yeah. and and i would not directly related to the book, but going off of that. like right I would say that's part of the problem with humanity, because you know you say that it can never be perfect, is that kind of like Hogfather, kind of like Christmas, we all have different ideas of what even these small beliefs are. So then when you get to the big beliefs like justice, we all have different ideas of what that means.
00:42:54
Speaker
right like ay ae The Punisher thinks justice is going out and killing the bad guys. right aye Batman thinks justice is arresting them for them to you know go out again, because apparently Arkham is just a leaky faucet. I don't understand. It's a very bad prism. So you know that's where a lot of the tension, and and you see that in different, it's not directly discussed as, you know but you see that in different parts of the book, right? With ah like the King ah right providing charity, quote unquote, ah to this beggar man, or I don't know, you're just a poor man.
00:43:33
Speaker
Uh, and the poor man keeps trying to like share back his meal that he like carefully prepared and wanted to eat. And the King's like, you should be grateful for this. Like this is charity, you know, and death's like, what is this? This is dumb. Right. This isn't, this isn't charity because this is what this guy wants. This is charity. What that's going to make you feel better. Right. Uh, where it's like, if the King had probably just shared some of the poor man's food, it would have gone fine.
00:43:59
Speaker
Yeah, the poor man was ecstatic at getting a pig's head so he could make some sort of awful brain dish from it. so And the people eating the boots. Right.
00:44:10
Speaker
yeah
00:44:12
Speaker
but That's making fun of high-end restaurants. You can serve anything. Put it a good go put a good enough so sauce on it and give it a sort of fake French name and you can you can make people eat anything.
00:44:26
Speaker
Um, yeah. And then, you know, death also points out the injustice and the fact that he's able to give the rich kids, you know, all this stuff. Uh, and the poor kids get like a toy soldier, right? Like, uh, and he's like, well, that's not fair. Uh, but Alfred points out that like, well, if you had given him some, if you'd given him something wealthy when he was a kid, his dad would assume he stole it and punished him and then sold it. So,
Role of Death in the Universe
00:44:53
Speaker
you know, it's like.
00:44:55
Speaker
The world is in just, right? And death, I guess, struggles with that a little bit because he's the ultimate, like, he's fair to everybody. Everybody dies. Right. Everyone gets the exact same treatment. And most people aren't happy to see him. He does say most. The the ones that are happy to see him tend to be in somewhat bad situations. Yes, yes. It's interesting, because death, again, is an extreme, and again,
00:45:21
Speaker
and This is odd to say, but death is an extremely sympathetic character throughout the entire series and any all of the books he's in. and um Terry Pratchett, we would would tell in the in that he would occasionally get letters from from terminally ill people who would tell him that he they really hoped that death was what he portyed portrayed in his books. and He said that that those letters always made him sort of stare at the wall for a while. I mean i think that's a now it's a pretty common... I mean, this death is probably more human. but quote unquote. But I think you see that in a lot of adaptions of death, that it's just like, he he just is, right? He just kills everyone. So I, you know, like, in the end, the rich, the poor, the president, the king, the nobody beggar, like death comes for us all, right? Right. Yeah. And I actually wonder, I wonder when that
00:46:18
Speaker
when would When would you say that that depiction and in sci-fi fantasy started? Because I wonder if it started with Game and Sandman. I don't know. I feel like it's older. Because I feel like the idea of the grim reaper and whether it's scary versus like evening. Or a guy doing his job. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. Because I see it a lot now, right? Like right there's a lot of grim reaper representation.
00:46:46
Speaker
In the early aughts, there was Dead Like Me, right which is about grim reapers. That was a good show. Yeah. though ah there not Those deaths are much more crazy. ah No. but Well, they're just humans who became grim reapers, right? And then in Supernatural, there's ah there's a death figure who's probably more like the Sandman one, where it's like,
00:47:14
Speaker
he's like separate and almost older than God, right? So, and it's just like, he's just like, this is what I do. Like, and it's not even like doing a job, like he's like, oh, it's a job. He's just like, I am, this is. This is the thing that's gonna happen. Yeah. They do end up killing death, but not really, because right, it's like this book, right? Where if you killed death, Susan would just become death, right? Right. Another person. One of those old clown dolls, when you punch it, it pops right back up again. Yeah.
00:47:43
Speaker
Yeah. Like, cause you, you can't stop nature. Right. Well, I suppose, you know, in Torchwood they do for one season and it's horrible. Right. So I don't know. I don't, I don't know. I'm trying to think like, what is the earliest chronologically adaption of death outside of like a Christmas Carol? Cause I would say the ghost of Christmas future is death, which is kind of portrayed as scary, but also kind of not. Right. It's scary to Ebony's or Scrooge.
00:48:13
Speaker
because he doesn't want to die. Right. But again, and just so sort of being ah portrayed as is something that that's inescapable and it's just something that's going to happen. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. And I do think that's interesting. You know, the the Scrooge death versus death death, like and going back to the death in this book is Scrooge is scared of death because he doesn't want to die. He is the rich man who doesn't want to be evened out. Right. ah like And so, like,
00:48:43
Speaker
death in this book like probably has that same interaction with Kings and Richmond, right? I feel like, oh. But nobody has enough time. Right. Or this isn all those Silicon Valley billionaires who are doing the the sort of creepy wackadoodle. The blood bags. The blood bags, yeah. Yeah. you know And it's like there's a nothing you can do, right? like I just had a college friend who just died in a car accident.
00:49:13
Speaker
like he was completely healthy. He has four kids, right? Like, uh, yeah. And it's just like, there's no amount of like exercise that's going to get you out of like, right? Things that happen. So, uh, and which is kind of like the little match girl, right? Uh, though death does save her. Cause he's like, this is not hogs watch. Uh, it's also just, it's a, you know, Hans Christian Anderson, you want to have a talk like,
00:49:44
Speaker
Why? like is it's It's supposed to be better that that, okay, all right. Well, I think that's the thing about Christmas,
Christmas Themes in 'Hogfather'
00:49:51
Speaker
right? Not to get like, astrological or whatever. Christmas is at the darkest time of the year. And while it's like, Christian Christmas is like hope in the dark, and a lot of pagan Christmases are kind of like that too. it Christmas is also kind of this recognition that life is dark. Right. And you needed a hope.
00:50:13
Speaker
Right? Because like, otherwise, yeah, you're just going to die in the snow. Yep. I mean, not if you live in places that don't have snow, but you know, it's, it's the darkest time of year and that's why, you know, everybody centered on it. The Christian Christmas being put on, you know, Saturnalia, because it's like, this is the time of year when people need this hope, right? As opposed to like,
00:50:40
Speaker
doing it in the spring or summer when Jesus probably was born. When the sch shepherds might actually have been watching their flocks at night. Yeah. Yeah. Like so we're we're not dumb people. Like we know that, you know, like every once in a while, obviously you're an atheist. I'm agnostic. Agnostic. Yeah. And I'm a Christian and like, you know, you, you have those like internet bro atheists who are like, Oh, I'm going to Trump you. Obviously Jesus wasn't born on December 25th. And you're like, yeah, like,
00:51:10
Speaker
And your point being what? i We all know this, people. Because they were trying to sell the faith. And and you know noah we are definitely not going to take away your awesome end of the year. Don't worry. The sun is going to come back. Party. Hey, look, Saturnalia was a week long, though. We have been jipped. We have. Yeah. And to be fair, it wasn't the Christians who jipped us because Catholic Christmas and the olden times used to be a lot longer. 12 days. Yeah. 12 days, the whole 12th night.
00:51:40
Speaker
modern times that have winnowed us down to like a day in an evening. It's the Puritans. The Puritans. It's always the Puritans, Erica. It's always the Puritans. No, right. Because I actually saw a funny meme that went around that like, the you know, some Puritan guy would be a war on Christmas. That sounds badass.
00:52:00
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, well, the Jehovah's Witness, I don't think are even the only group that don't believe in like, quote unquote, holidays, right? Within Uh, Jehovah's Witnesses aren't really Christian. They're like on an out bubble, but there's other Christian groups that also do our anti-holiday, right? Cause they'd say like, well, every Sunday you're celebrating Eastern Christmas. Right. There used to be some, there used to be some, there's like some Presbyterian variants that are particularly hammerless. Yeah. Uh, personally, I like Christmas. Uh, I think it's nice lighting candles, singing silent nights. It's cool. Christmas, like I think this book talks kind of a lot about like Christmas is dark.
00:52:39
Speaker
Yes. Right. And especially when you get to the end of the book with like the true hog father and like the pig, like it's disturbing. Right. When the pig being the pig being slaughtered for the year and the, you know, the old, the I don't know. And again, no one really knows how true these pagan myths were about, you know, you find that you find the bean and so your sacrifice to the son will come back. Or the the the one that that he brought he brings up a couple of times, which is actually a real thing, but they used to kill a wren in parts of Ireland and bring it around to show people on December 26th in sort of a trick-or-treating situation. And you're just like, why? You have no control over the world, right? yeah beating it like the people It's like the people who are like, I wore this pair of socks and my team won. So now I have to always wear this pair of socks. So one year you killed Ren and the sun came back. So now you have to kill Ren every year.
00:53:35
Speaker
yeah yeah A lot of the Nordic myths get really, really dark, but of course it's, you know, when you haven't seen the sun in several months and you're not going to see the sun again for several months, it affects from all of you. When
Mythological Creatures in Discworld
00:53:47
Speaker
you have 30 minutes of the sun is on the horizon. sit I don't know how people live in those places. Erica, how did your people survive? With grit, that's why we've got so much character. And alcohol. That's right, exactly.
00:54:04
Speaker
So in the end, uh, Susan has to kind of save hog father from the auditors who like become the dogs are part of the myth, which is weird to me that like the auditors are like participating in the myth. I think at that point they're starting to get corrupted by the world too. Yeah. I don't know if it it happens in this book that one of the, one of the auditors starts using a personal pronoun and has to be zapped out of the existence. Yeah, that's this book. He uses a personal pronoun and then they, uh, they zap him out of existence and then he reappears. Yeah.
00:54:33
Speaker
Yeah. I also feel like someone should go back and tell the hell of the Assassin's Guild, like in the future, don't take commissions for mythological creatures. I think you learned that one. And then that was the other one that was seen. I love was the poor Assassin's treasure having to deal with a whole bunch of gold out of nowhere in their vault. Take the money back in the end. Like at this sort I have these questions. Yeah. I feel like the even if they did the the Lord Downey of the Assassin's Guild would just be like, yeah, okay, whatever.
00:55:01
Speaker
I don't want to close the book. Let's let it go. And that also reminds me of the bursar who can apparently only do math and can't. Yeah, the poor bursar. The bursar being insane is a running gag through all the books with very varying levels of sanity. He's almost okay at the end.
Resolution and Themes in 'Hogfather'
00:55:16
Speaker
And then one of the dead bodies pops up in his food. That would do it to me, too, if a dead body just just appeared. So they save Hogg's watch in the end or they save Hogg's father. Death kind of saved Hogg's watch like everybody hidden got.
00:55:31
Speaker
stuff more than possibly they normally get. Presumably Hogg's Watch will happen normally next year. And Hogg messes everyone. Susan kills T-time. Yes. but So after everything goes down and they're back at the, ah at her, not her house, but in the nursery of the place where she works, death is there and he's like explaining everything. And you know, T-time shows up and tries to kill them. Susan thinks death has a plan.
00:56:00
Speaker
Death has no plan. Death is counting on Susan to have a plan. And she kills him with a poker, as she does with most monsters. Because in that nursery, the kids believe that in the po that the poker has power and it does. Yes. So yeah, the bad guy is defeated. Christmas is restored. Sorry, Cog's Watch. And they all live happily ever after, presumably. Until the next book.
00:56:22
Speaker
until the next book and there will be more shenanigans. I don't know I feel like Terry Pratchett books are pretty happily ever after even in the book like people die but it's so like optimistic and upbeat and like good will win in the end you know. That's actually and and Ursula Le Guin has that line about you know somehow we've gotten to the point where only darkness and death seems to be profound to people. Right. Pretty much all of Terry Pratchett's book have some variant on a happy ending. And I i agree with earth will liquid because one usually does that like we've gotten to this point where people are like, Oh, only grim dark books are real and gritty and like, and it's like, but we live in a real world and people believe in Christmas. Like, you know, I, like and atheists believe in Christmas. Like that people are out decorating their house and putting up trees. Like, you know, like you have to believe in the little lies. Yeah. And and that's what Terry Pratchett
00:57:20
Speaker
says, and I think there's actually something unbalanced about the Game of Thrones universe that's unrealistic, right? That it's so dark, it's too dark. Like people don't exist like this, and they didn't exist like this even in medieval times. Like, they have never, you know what, I mean, it is the fundamental cruelty, we are all going to die. The world might get killed by tea time, you might get killed by tea time, you might be like, unfortunately, like your friend in a car accident,
00:57:48
Speaker
I might slip on my way downstairs and break my neck. There's no rhyme or reason. There's no, I mean, at least from an atheist or agnostic perspective, there is no rhyme or reason. The world is cold and cruel. and The point is not, and that's not profound, right? That's just how the universe is. The profundity comes from humanity saying sometimes it's not, you know, sometimes it's the people getting together to work in the soup kitchen on the holiday to, you know, to it to ah help out their neighbor when they they need a hand.
00:58:17
Speaker
you know to to you know and get groceries for their neighbor who's broken their leg, or all of the the multiple kindnesses that humans do, both individually and collectively, that's actually what we need to be reaching for. And not just this sort of desperately nihilistic, oh, well, the world is dark and horrible, so there's no point in trying to be better. I actually think, not you know not to get too real world, that this is the problem with the 24-hour news cycle, right? that We, we've overemphasized how bad the world is. And it's like, yes, your kid could get kidnapped off the streets, but the chances of that are actually incredibly small. And it's more likely if your kid is wandering the streets, a well-meaning adult is going to find them and return them home. Right. That is far more likely to happen than someone's going to kidnap them and they're going to be the next John Renee Ramsey, right? Like, but we focus so much on the bad.
00:59:16
Speaker
that now, you know, I read some story about a woman who had CPS called on her and she was arrested because her son walked a quarter of a mile. Right. And he was 11. Right. Like, so it's just like in a small town where everybody knows everybody. And even from ah a Christian perspective, like I know also Christians tend to overemphasize a lot of times like we're sinful nature, blah, blah, blah, blah. But like, even if you look at like the Bible,
00:59:42
Speaker
It's like God created us and we were good and then we were tainted. So we're inherently good with a taint, which I feel like is different than inherently bad. And and that's something that i I guess I really believe in that like we, most people return their shopping carts. Yes. Why? There's no reward. Like we do it because it makes us a good society, right? Most people, if they see a little kid wandering around, they're going to return them to their parents. Right. Most people will help you now.
01:00:12
Speaker
we all have different views of what help is. And sometimes we don't want to help certain people or put ourselves in awkward scenarios. Cause we're also, you know, we're not, or we're like, I'm not the right person to help and you know, or whatever it is. But I do feel like there is hope and that the Terry Pratchett hope is not wrong. It's as much reality as or more reality than the grim darkness of some of these other books. I think the grim darkness is again, it's, I think it's also fairly lazy.
01:00:41
Speaker
you know, going back to the, if this is just how it is, I don't have to try. Yeah. I don't have to try and make my world a better place because there's no point in doing that. The world is never going to be a better place. And that's, that's
Influence of Media on Society
01:00:53
Speaker
so fundamentally wrong. And that's, that's basically how the status quo gets maintained. The world, will you know, you might not succeed in making the world a better place if you try and do everything you want to do to help people. Um, but you know, the one way to guarantee it's really never going to happen is to never try. Right.
01:01:12
Speaker
Like if you believe all people are inherently bad, why should you help them? Right. You know, there's a lot of Twitter discourse, mom forum discourse with the not returning the shopping cart thing, particularly like, I guess a reason women don't do it is because they think their kids are going to get stolen ah in the parking lot of the grocery store. And it's like, so thinking people are inherently bad and that your two year old is going to get kidnapped while you're returning the shopping cart.
01:01:41
Speaker
like then leads you to do this bad thing of not returning the shopping cart, right? So it's like, it's like a snowball effect. Cause I think other people are bad. That justifies my bad behavior. Yeah. And i short of completely remaking the media, media ecosystem. I'm not sure how you fix that. Yeah. I don't, I, I think we're in a weird, cause it's not just 24 hour news right now. We also have social media, which highlights bad stories, highlights rage bait. So we're just in a really bad cycle of like the world is ending.
01:02:11
Speaker
And it's just like, even if the world is ending, people still had kids and celebrated Christmas and birthdays when the world was ending. Right. Like people have literally lived in times where like their whole village is starving to death and they still took a moment to light candles for Christmas or try to find something for their kid's birthday. Right. Like we that's, that's what makes us human. i But I online, I see a lot of like the world is ending, so just don't get it out of bed.
01:02:41
Speaker
And it's like, well, that's how you give up, right? but Like that's. Your world will definitely end if you do that. Yes. Yes. So
Influence of Discworld on Fantasy Genre
01:02:52
Speaker
read Terry Pratchett and get your optimism back people. Yes. That even when you have incompetent bureaucrats and academics, uh, running things, it's going to be okay. Creepy, creepy, uh, creepy beings trying to, trying to destroy what what makes humanity great.
01:03:11
Speaker
Yes, those auditors, they're like the Dementors. Yes, exactly. They don't suck people's soul, I guess. I don't know. It's funny, actually. um Terry Pratchett would get a lot of questions, even though the Discworld books have been out since the 80s, and the Unseen University was one of the early things he came up with. He would get questions about if he if the and Unseen University it had been inspired by Hogwarts. That's normal, right? like That's what people do. that's like when John Carter came out and everybody's like, this is a ripoff of Superman. Nope. No, it really, really is not. And actually the Constantine show struggled from that when they tried to make it, right? Because so much supernatural type dramas are based on the Constantine comic. Oh, when they finally made a show. People are like, well, this is just a ripoff of XYZ show. Like there's more than one show, right? That they're like,
01:04:04
Speaker
this is just a rehash of Buffy or supernatural or whatever it is. And it's like, no, all of these things are influenced by Constantine. Like he was kind of the first PI supernatural detective, right? And everybody else comes from that. ah But that's that's the way people's brains work. The first thing they're exposed to, they're like, oh, well this is a ripoff. It'd be like people being like, Star Wars is a ripoff of Arrogant. And I'm sure there are kids who have said that, but it's like, that's not true.
01:04:33
Speaker
It's whatever you're exposed to first. And look, I never get tired of stories set in a wizard academia environment. Just give me more publishing. You can never have too much. Never. You can have petty intrigue and nasty things coming up from the dungeon dimensions. And we all identify with school. Who didn't go to school? The unseen university.
01:04:57
Speaker
yeah don't play the organ while being in the bathroom. Like, okay, isn't that hard? Did he have to close up the bathroom? Couldn't he just put up a sign that said, don't use these buttons? Well, that's left as a mystery of what exactly happened to poor Rude Coley in that bathroom. But I assume it had to do with the organ being played and the fact that those buttons were in fact labeled organ. Right. And, you know, you're, you're trusting yourself to something made by Burgold Stutley Johnson. So he's around another running sort sort of, sort of running gag.
01:05:27
Speaker
that if you wanted him design to design a surface-to-air missile, you'd ask him to make a small ornamental fountain. You know, inventors. Right. What
Terry Pratchett's Humor and Style
01:05:37
Speaker
can you do? All right, well, is there anything else you want to say about Hogswatch? No, hot Father. there You want more Pratchett reading lists, you can contact me. and But yeah, and thank you for thank you for reading along and giving it a try. No, I didn't.
01:05:55
Speaker
I don't know if that's right. It all came together in the end. I enjoyed the ending. It's just hard to get into sometimes for me. But once again, I always feel like there are people asking for what books should I give my middle schooler who reads above and beyond. And I don't want them reading a bunch of torrid romance because Terry Pratchett, it's right there. It's right there, people.
01:06:22
Speaker
yep and it's Got good themes, good morals, no like really even real world cursing. I'm trying to actually think. Not even in the later books. I don't really think there is. there's in a couple of In one of the later books, there's a fairly good parody of pulp fiction in two of the characters. And the the character just says ing, ing, like but that ing thing. And of course, it's obvious.
01:06:54
Speaker
a very British thing to like censor curse words too. Like even when you use them in a book, it'll be like, they do like, I think it's like F-dashing or whatever. Right. And that's, and the, I mean, it's, ah it's fairly obviously implied it's the, there's a line in there about, um, the, the, the joke is that this complete and utter bastard boorish character sees antiques, can understand antiques like nothing else. And so he's very upset about this, this, um, virginal that's not being taken care of correctly. The musical instrument.
01:07:25
Speaker
And he says, it's you know someone makes a reference to the Woodyard guy like the harpsichord. He says, it's not a harpsichord. It's a virginal. It's an it's an instrument for in old young ladies. And one of the other guys says, I thought it was just a sort of musical instrument.
01:07:40
Speaker
um
Podcast Conclusion
01:07:44
Speaker
ah But yeah, there's that there's there's there's i mean there's obviously sex in the books, but it's not it's not nothing ever explicit. Not graphic, no. yeah i it's yeah A lot of very hardcore nerd jokes that you might not get till years later. Or effort.
01:08:03
Speaker
yeah such or I'm like, this is a joke. And I don't know if I get it. yeah like yesterday I don't know how many people are know about like, yes, Virginia, there is a sinno Santa Claus. I know about that. But that's because Macy's did a whole commercial and campaign with that. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So sometimes, you know, jokes can especially the earlier books that are written, you know, in the eighties and nineties, it could be topical to things that, uh, a modern reader who is young may not be aware of, but you can still enjoy the whole story without knowing what every line is a reference to. Right. So yeah, so we recommend Terry Pratchett. What books should people start with Erica? Uh, I would suggest Men in Arms or Small Gods. Um, and Monsters Regiment is also a good one.
01:08:51
Speaker
There you go. Do not start with the color of magic. Do not start with the color of magic. Small Gods it's about is the one I was talking about where the the the faith in the god goes away and is replaced with the faith in the structure of the church. And the the god has to get his his the god has to get his his followers back. And then Men in Arms is one of the first watchbooks. I think it's the most accessible early watchbook talking about the expansion of the city police force in Angkorpork.
01:09:21
Speaker
and dealing with ah another, it's another sort of assassins heavy plot where one of the assassins goes high and to the right with some ungentlemanly behavior. um And then Monsters Regiment is about, it's about war and it's it's one of the, it's hilariously funny but also hilariously awful in that there's this small country that's been war torn for years and years and years and years and they have gone through all of their young men and they accidentally,
01:09:50
Speaker
ah recruit an entire sort of regiment of young women who are all pretending to be boys. the my And it's the um it's it's the monstrous regiment. It's a reference to the, when both Elizabeth and Mary were queen, there was a, ah someone wrote a pamphlet, and I can't remember the name of the author right now, about a blast of the trumpet against this monstrous regiment of women.
01:10:16
Speaker
um against the women rulers, so it's a monstrous regiment, then it's about them sort of dealing with the, it's about the futility of war and, and again, a lot about gender roles, which for a, at the time, 50-something men in the early 2000s, Terry Pratchett handles. I have no notes on on how he is a daughter. Yes. who He always said that and what he really wanted to be known for in this world was to be the father, to be known as the father of Rihanna Pratchett.
01:10:47
Speaker
Um, but he handles, like yes, he handled the subject extremely well. So those for our young female readers, I do also recommend the Tiffany aching book to start with. We free men. Right. And there are four of those and they can be read completely standalone from the rest of the universe. Yes. ah Again, there are references that you'll see if you know. Yep.
01:11:12
Speaker
yep All right, well, thank you for joining us, Erica. Thank you for having us. This lovely Hogs Watch episode. Happy Hogs Watch, everyone. Yes. Happy Hogs Watch. Merry Christmas. This is why we say happy holidays. So celebrate whatever. Celebrate as you will. Don't eat the bean. Don't eat the bean. Don't eat the bean. All right. Thank you, Erica. Thank you.
01:11:40
Speaker
We hope you enjoyed this episode and that you will join us again next month on January 15th. I'll be welcoming back Jessica Camacho to continue our discussion of Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time with Book 3, The Dragon Reborn. Thank you for listening to Mandemonium. You can find me, Mandy, on Twitter, at brown underscore aja. That's A-J-A-H.
01:12:00
Speaker
You can also find the podcast on Twitter at Mandemonium Pod, and we also have a podcast Facebook page. Theme music for this podcast was created by Skips of Beat Music. Thank you so much for listening, and we hope you come back next time.