Warning – this post contains Spoilers to Terry Pratchett’s new book “The Shepherds Crown”. If you haven’t read it and don’t want to know what does or doesn’t happen (in part), please bookmark this page and come back later!
If you’ve already read it, or aren’t much bothered about a spoiler, (it’s a big one..) then carry on!
Sidney Sheldon once was quoted as saying “A blank piece of paper is God’s way of telling us how hard it is to be God”. And that, in part, is one reason I find it extremely hard to do any kind of fiction writing.
Those people I imagine up out of nowhere, their lives, their joys, their woes – are all down to my imagination- little me. Only one time have I ever managed to create a whole village, story line, plot, house – in minute detail for a particular story. I even drew a map of the village on a scrappy bit of paper, and drew the main house involved too – including the garden, its river, and the fact it was west facing so you could go hop over the wall and sit at the top of the field, back to the stone wall and watch the sun set with the warmth of the sun on you.
Maybe I take creating lives / writing too seriously! But one of my favourite authors who got on with the terrible responsibility of writing is Sir Terry Pratchett (Long may his name be whispered on the Klacks!).
I’ve followed the writings of Sir Terry for some years now. A boyfriend (at the time) introduced me to him and is one of the things I will be ever grateful for. Oh I would probably have come across him (TP) sooner or later, but I’m glad it was sooner.
When Sir Terry was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimers disease in 2007 I panicked. What about the Disc? What would happen to all those characters? And then, seemingly nothing seemed to happen. He didn’t appear to deteriorate, if anything his writing became more prolific. I think though, if I were faced with the fact that my mind would one day wander off on its own somewhere and get lost down a drainpipe – that would be motivation indeed to get writing in a flurry. Book after book appeared. And I for one, forgot that the hourglass was for Sir Terry perhaps moving faster towards empty than it maybe should have done.
The 12th of March, 2015 and we were greeted with the news that Sir Terry had moved onto the next great adventure.
And then shortly after – the news that the last Discworld book (number 41) would be released on August 27th 2015 – The Shepherds Crown.
Wow. What a birthday present. My 40th birthday was the release date for the last ever Discworld novel. Definitely a bittersweet day all round. At some point in the afternoon we wandered to the town and I purchased a copy.
I did wait until I got home before opening the book. And right there – the dedication “For Granny Weatherwax, Mind how you go”.
Nervous tinglings ran up my arms. Granny Weatherwax? Surely not? I think in that moment I thought that Sir Terry would move onto the next adventure but that the main stalwarts of the characters on the Disc would just remain there – in suspended animation if you like, worthy of that thing we humans sometimes wish for – immortality.
But then thinking about it. Lets just imagine if you like – how many people actually read the Discworld books? More people than read the bible? Well maybe not quite, but I’ll wager its still a lot.
In fact, as we walked to the bookshop to get the book I commented to my other half that I had aspirations of being like Granny Weatherwax, but in all honesty was probably more like Nanny Ogg, but actually reverts to Magrat when under stress… Esme was definitely a favourite.
Referring back to one of Sir Terry’s earlier books “Small Gods” the thesis is that:-
Gods on the Discworld exist as long as people believe in them and their power grows as their followers increase. This is a philosophy echoing the real-world politics of the power of religion and is most detailed in the novel Small Gods. If people should cease believing in a particular god (say, if the religion becomes more important than faith) the god begins to fade and, eventually, will “die”, becoming little more than a faded wispy echo.
So, surely if a large amount of people read these books, then what’s to say that the Discworld hasn’t popped into an alternative universe somewhere that transcends the Earth based time/logic/space theories?
As I continued to read the start of the book, I became more and more upset with Sir Terry for taking Esme out of the Discworld. The lady who introduced me to “headology” (and then I went on to do NLP and Hynosis due in large part to Esme’s Headology…) and who talks straight and tells it like it is. And she was gone. Just like that.
I think I was in shock as I read the rest of the book. And it was only afterwards I thought “well what would you have done?”
If I was the creator of all those lives on the disc, what would I have done? More importantly, if I were going onto the next big adventure who would I want with me?
Esme.
All is forgiven Sir Terry.
Mind how you go.
PS – Don’t take this blog post too seriously!!