How did you "get into" Discworld?

[RathDarkblade]

I'm not sure if this thread has ever come up before. I searched, and couldn't find it. If it exists somewhere, please feel free to close this thread.

But the question stands: how were you made aware of Discworld? Who or what made you interested in Discworld to start with?

A long-ago friend gave me his copy of the Discworld video game. I tried it, got stuck, tried again, got stuck, and eventually beat the game. But it made me curious about Ankh-Morpork, Rincewind, Captain Vimes, and the other characters in the game.

So, I went to my local library and, one by one, started reading the Discworld books there (beginning with "Interesting Times", because I was intrigued by the cover ... and also because I recognised Rincewind from the game). I didn't quite understand everything that was going on (e.g. who was this Arch-chancellor Ridcully?), but I was sufficiently intrigued to want to know more. Especially after the cliff-hanger ending. So, I tried other books - I think "The Colour of Magic" was my second book, "Guards! Guards!" was the third.

After that, I actively hunted through second-hand bookshops (and eventually new bookshops too) for all Discworld books I could find, put them in order, and started reading from "The Colour of Magic" ... and eventually found the L-Space website. By this time, Discworld II: Missing Presumed...!? came out, and I found and played it.

Two years later, Discworld Noir (easily the most 'Pratchett-ish' of the Discworld games - i.e. it reminded me so much of the books!) came out, and I snapped it up.

I kept on reading Discworld through the years, but "Discworld Noir" made me curious about noir fashion and noir fiction, but I couldn't find any in my corner of Fourecks ... until, 20 years later, I saw a copy of The Big Sleep in one of my favourite second-hand bookshops. I looked at it, bought it, read it, and quickly tried (and succeeded) in getting a copy of everything else by Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett ... and ... um ... whoops. This is a Discworld thread, isn't it?

Anyway, I've rambled enough. How about you? How did you get into Discworld - and where did it lead you?

 

[Molokov]

I was 12, and a friend loaned me a copy of The Colour of Magic and said "here, I think you'll like this". He wasn't wrong. I then borrowed the remaining books up to that point (probably the first 8 or so) from him and devoured them, and then started buying my own copies when I could afford it. It came to a point mid-series where I would borrow the hardcovers from him or another friend, and then buy the paperbacks when they came out. And then I started buying the hardcovers myself.

And here I am, over 30 years later, running[1] another Discworld convention

[1] Well, helping to run. I'm vice-chair, acting as chair due our chair taking some parental leave for a few months.

 

[=Tamar]

Hmm. I was already into SF and Fantasy, and a friend got me to go to a convention, where I met my first husband. We went to cons and he also belonged to the SF Book Club. The first book was picked up by the SFBC but I hated the end (I'm not into Doug Adams-style black humor), so I didn't get the second one. The blurb for the third one was good so I gave him another chance. A few years later another fan told me the second book fixed the problem with the first, si I eventually found a copy. I think I liked them but wasn't really hooked until Wyrd Sisters, and Guards! Guards! clinched it.

The sequence went:
1. Wait for the SFBC edition.
2. Wait for the paperback.
3. Buy the hardcover, scouring the second-hand stores
4. Buy the UK hardcover new if someone brought it over.
5. Order the UK hardcover from a contact in the UK.
6. Buy both the UK and the USA hardcovers, to compare them,
and also buy the paperback in case someone wants to borrow it.

It was hard to get Pratchett books in the USA back then. You had to either hope the book club got them or find a connection. Dealers would go to the UK and bring back a suitcase full. Eventually the US publishers understood how much money they were losing to the gray market and began to reprint them in a more timely manner.

Oddly enough, I have almost never lost a Pratchett book. People I lend to have always returned them.
Even Good Omens. The exception was my mother, who gave the set of lending paperbacks to the library, which I forgave because the librarian was so happy to get them and I saw they were on the shelves and being taken out.

 

[Penfold]

It was back in the eighties, around the time 'Equal Rites' was published, and a work colleague recommended the DW books. I started with 'Colour of Magic' and loved the way Terry lampooned my favourite authors, along with the fantasy genre in general, without being offensive to them. It helped that, when it came to magic in a magical world, he didn't just come up with a spell out of thin air to get the hero out of a tricky situation. I read all the books in order as and when they were published after that.

 

[Tonyblack]

My brother bought a copy of the paperback of The Colour of Magic, when it first came out, and loaned it to me. I was hooked from then on.

 

[Djinnantonix]

On a trip to London, in that huge Waterstones (think it's still there) - I found the "sci f and fantasy" section, tried a Michael Moorcock and didn't like it; but there was The Colour of Magic! I did not want to put that book back on the shelf

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

I was at Fantasycon in Birmingham, and sitting at breakfast early on my own when Terry came in and asked if he could join me when I told him I had just bought The Light Fantastic a short time ago, it had just recently come out we had a good chat for half an hour. So that was the start of many happy years of reading Discworld books. It is a happy memory before he was mega famous that I treasure.

 

[Who's Wee Dug]

On a trip to London, in that huge Waterstones (think it's still there) - I found the "sci f and fantasy" section, tried a Michael Moorcock and didn't like it; but there was The Colour of Magic! I did not want to put that book back on the shelf

On a trip to London, in that huge Waterstones (think it's still there) - I found the "sci f and fantasy" section, tried a Michael Moorcock and didn't like it; but there was The Colour of Magic! I did not want to put that book back on the shelf

That is the Flagship Waterstones in Piccadilly where the Launch of Nation limited edition was held.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place...0.136048!10e5!16s/g/1tmbvlq9?hl=en&entry=ttu#

 

[Penfold]

I was at Fantasycon in Birmingham, and sitting at breakfast early on my own when Terry came in and asked if he could join me when I told him I had just bought The Light Fantastic a short time ago, it had just recently come out we had a good chat for half an hour. So that was the start of many happy years of reading Discworld books. It is a happy memory before he was mega famous that I treasure.

That's something I liked about Terry, he always had time for his fans and made himself accessible without any airs and graces.

 

[Quatermass]

Hmm, good bloody question. I'm not quite certain, but I actually suspect it was stumbling across one of the old Cosgrove Hall animations on the ABC, specifically Soul Music.

 

[=Tamar]

That Cosgrove Hall animation of Soul Music is one of my favorites, partly because each song was written to parody multiple originals - the title played off one, the verses another, the musical style often a third - and it was still good.

 

[Penfold]

It also had the killer line, "We're bigger than cheeses", that didn't appear in the book (reference to the infamous Beatles quote, for anyone who hasn't seen it). I don't know if Terry had any input into the Cosgrove Hall animation, but I think he would have been proud of that one.

 

[Tonyblack]

It also had the killer line, "We're bigger than cheeses", that didn't appear in the book (reference to the infamous Beatles quote, for anyone who hasn't seen it). I don't know if Terry had any input into the Cosgrove Hall animation, but I think he would have been proud of that one.

It was a very "Terry" line.

 

[RathDarkblade]

Hold on, it doesn't?! Hmm, you're right, Penfold - it doesn't. *shrug* I was just remembering it wrong. Then again, it's been decades since I saw it last (sometime in the late 1990s on VHS, if anyone remembers VHS nowadays).

Memory is a funny thing and lays* tricks on you.

I always liked that Cosgrove Hall adaptation, especially the psychedelic effects when Buddy and the Band play a 70s-style hit. (I can't recall its name now, sorry).

But I also enjoyed the Cosgrove Hall adaptation of Wyrd Sisters, so I find it odd that everyone seems to either hate or dislike it (or at least, be indifferent to it). *shrug* Any ideas why?

______________________
* Typo, of course. I wanted to say "plays", but memory laying** tricks on you (assuming memory is like a chicken) also works.

** Memory can also waylay you -- if you go down Memory Lane, of course (which you can find if you go down Penny Lane and then digress, which is what I'm doing right now).

 

[=Tamar]

I once played the Wyrd Sisters VHS tape for some pagans and they enjoyed it. It was something of a captive audience - we were waiting while other people were preparing for an event.
I think the Cosgrove Hall animations suffered from a slow pace. I admit, after the first live action special, I couldn't enjoy the animations as much.

 

[RathDarkblade]

I agree the animations suffered from a slow pace ... although that's what happens when you try to adapt a book to another medium. You either try to squeeze in as much of the non-essentials and jokes as you can (which pleases the hard-core purists, but makes everyone else think it's too slow), or try to cut some of the above non-essentials (which moves the plot along, but infuriates the abovementioned purists).

I've read some of the books where Discworld was translated to the stage, where Stephen Briggs goes into this eternal problem.

Sometimes, of course, the screenwriters also insert new characters or change existing ones. This happened during the live-action special of "Going Postal". (IIRC, it also happened to Raymond Chandler during the first Hollywood recreation of "The Big Sleep", which he was hired to work on as a screenwriter, together with Billy Wilder. Ray didn't enjoy the experience, and I can't say I blame him.)

 

[=Tamar]

That happened with the stage play of - Mort, I think it was - where Stephen Briggs felt that it would be jarring to introduce Rincewind for two minutes to an audience that didn't know the rest of the series, so with Sir Terry's permission, he renamed the character Ponder Stibbons. Since Ponder then existed, Sir Terry began using him.

 

[RathDarkblade]

Yep. IIRC, Stephen wrote in all the STP stage-play books something like this: "As with all the adaptations, there were difficult decisions about which scenes should be sacrificed to try and keep the play down to a reasonable running time."

This always happens when you try to translate a book into a play, movie, radio show, TV show, or film. I'm sure everyone knows that. I'm as much of a purist as the next STP fan, but even I have to agree that if the play goes on for more than two hours, you have a problem.

And before anyone says "Don't be ridiculous, no play goes on for more than two hours nowadays" etc... may I present for your delectation Moose Murders, a notorious Broadway flop that opened and closed on 22 February 1983. Its length is only the start of its problems. Despite (or maybe because of) its sheer awfulness, it is occasionally revived.