History WMG / Snuff

As we saw in ''Discworld/SmallGods'' there is a hermit, St. '''Ungulant''', who worships the small gods and gets illusions of great food, drink, and other pleasures in return for belief. In ''Discworld/{{Jingo}}'' the Discworld equivalent of Saint Elmo's Fire appears, called St. Ungulant's Fire: a storm full of magic or possibly raw belief, raining down fish or other things strange things since people think that that is what a "magic" storm would do. Clearly the word ''Unggue'' is from a similar root, about belief: Goblins are meta-aware that their belief in the value of all their bodily secretions imbues those substances with ''belief'' and make ''Unggue'' pots to hold what is essentially raw belief given physical form. ''Unggue'' pots are made to prevent the leakage or loss of any belief, without which goblins might fade away and cease to exist.


Disworld - Unggue and Ungulant

Goblins' Unggue (SNUFF): collection of bodily secretions in magic pots, not allowing any belief or proof of existence leak away?

The city could certainly use one, and Young Sam's intellectual curiosity and deep appreciation for the written word are well-established (albeit a bit mucky) in this book.

Near the end of the novel, a gecko watches Vimes 'with jewelled eyes'. Discworld gods can disguise their form, but not their eyes. The colour is not given, but it could be... The Lady.

* Vendetta? This troper assumed Pterry might be setting Vetinari up to ''marry'' the crossword-writer in a future book. One day he'll stop off at that pet shop to get Mr. Fusspot a new toy, and realize that the owner's talked all the puppies and kittens into cleaning their own cages for her...

* Vendetta? This troper assumed Pterry might be setting Vetinari up to ''marry'' the crossword-writer in a future book.

* At the L-Space Wiki, in the pre-publication speculation concerning what the novel was going to be about, we turned up a potential ''third'' meaning of "shuff", in the context of a novel about the making of a certain sort of porn movie. (No, not one involving torture and murder, but descriptive of a sexual practice known by the japanese word "bukakke" which the authjor pointed out is degrading to ''everyone'' involved. Our minds duly boggled...)

Similarly, there have been throwaway gags and one-liners accross the books and writings revealing a little bit more about a recognisable "Africa". A black state is ruled by a King Samuel who has an Amazon bodyguard (parellels Dahomey); Sybil Ramkin's grandfather led an Ankh-Morporkian army expedition to the continent to seek new enemies, and may have fought a battle at ''Lawkes' Drain'' (evoking both the Zulu Wars and the Boer War); two elephant-wranglers brought a thousand elephants all the way out of Howondaland; a teacher at the Assassins' Guild school may hail from a "White Howondaland" not unlike Rhodesia or the old South Africa; and in ''Snuff'' we see Precious Jolson travel "home" to find her roots, and we have Gravid Rust's tropical tobacco farm worked by slaves. In "Jingo", the big clue is dropped that at one point, the Ankh-Morporkian Empire stretched ''all'' the way across Klatch and Howondaland. Some Discworld species of animals have Afrikaans names, like "meerkat" and "bewilderbeeste". On the Discworld, this begs the question of ''who named them in that language''. A Discworld South africa - ''Rimwards Howondaland'' - is in the offing? It could well have been settled by people from the Central Continent, some of whom spoke a lnguage closely related to Morporkian and who came from a Sto state famed for windmills, tulips, clogs, Seamstresses advertising themselves behind big plate glass windows, and that yellow cheese sealed in red wax which nobody tells you is inedible wax until you try and eat some. (Hence the name: "Ohdamn") ...

Similarly, there have been throwaway gags and one-liners accross the books and writings revealing a little bit more about a recognisable "Africa". A black state is ruled by a King Samuel who has an Amazon bodyguard (parellels Dahomey); Sybil Ramkin's grandfather led an Ankh-Morporkian army expedition to the continent to seek new enemies, and may have fought a battle at ''Lawkes' Drain''; two elephant-wranglers brought a thousand elephants all the way out of Howondaland; a teacher at the Assassins' Guild school may hail from a "White Howondaland" not unlike Rhodesia or the old South Africa; and in ''Snuff'' we see Precious Jolson travel "home" to find her roots, and we have Gravid Rust's tropical tobacco farm worked by slaves...

* Or maybe Pterry released a fake title as a prank, because nobody believed him when he revealed the ''last'' Watch novel was going to be called "Thud!". ;-)

[[WMG:The Gecko is a disguised God, keeping an eye on Vimes.]]

Not ''really'', anyway. Vimes grew up in, survived in, and came to be one of the most powerful figures in ''[[WretchedHive Ankh-Morpork]]''. Even the dark guards would probably have little trouble handling someone like Stratford; put him up against a real monster like Carcer--or Vimes, the guy who beat him--and he's going home crying. If he goes home at all. But because he happened to be more vicious than most people in a quiet country town, Stratford was something of a SmallNameBigEgo [[BitPartBadGuys Bit Part Bad Guy]]--certainly a dangerous criminal, but nothing Vimes hadn't seen before.

In GoingPostal, we learn about the circular time theory when discussin Anghammarad, who is hoping the deliver his letter when the universe ends and is reborn, a quite literal second chance. And now the universe has done so. Question is, did Anghammarad deliver that letter in time or not?

While he's not the only CompleteMonster villain to bear a strong resemblance to Carcer, he's probably the ''most'' similar, in actions and in other characters' descriptions--arguably to the point of being a full {{Expy}}. Maybe that's just random coincidence, or maybe it's the TheoryOfNarrativeCausality...or maybe it's just InTheBlood. Stratford isn't from Ankh-Morpork, but that doesn't really refute anything: he could've been born there and left sometime before ''Snuff'' happened, or Carcer could've grown up in the country and only come to A-M shortly before ''Night Watch'', or possibly the MissingMom left A-M to keep up a StigmaticPregnancyEuphemism. And since we don't know how old Carcer was in ''Night Watch''and six years later Stratford is only in his early twenties, it's absolutely mathematically plausible.

In GoingPostal, we learn about the circular time theory when discussin Anghammarad, who is hoping the deliver his letter when the universe ends and is reborn, a quite literal second chance. And now the universe has done so. Question is, did Anghammarad deliver that letter in time or not?

We know that Vimes and Vetinari is around the same age, and Vimes frequently mentions to himself that he is getting too old for his job. At the same time, we see Vetinari assassinating somebody out of sheer disgust, while almost having a vendetta against a ''cross-word writer of all things!'' On top of that, he gets all mushy over a goblin playing a harp for half an hour. He is simply not as ruthless as he used to be, because he is getting old and weary of the job.

Similarly, there have been throwaway gags and one-liners accross the books and writings revealing a little bit more about a recognisable "Africa". A black state is ruled by a King Samuel who has an Amazon bodyguard (parellels Dahomey); Sybil Ramkin's grandfather led an Ankh-Morporkian army expedition to the continent to seek new enemies, and may have fought a battle at ''Lawkes' Drain''; two elephant-wranglers brought a thousand elephants all the way out of Howondaland; a teacher at the Assassins' Guild school may hail from a "White Howondaland" not unlike Rhodesia or the old South Africa; and in ''Snuff'' we see Precious Jolson travel "home" to find her roots, and we have Gravid Rust's tropical tobacco farm worked by slaves...

Similarly, there have been throwaway gags and one-liners accross the books and writings revealing a little bit more about a recognisable "Africa". A black state is ruled by a King Samuel who has an Amazon bodyguard (parellels Dahomey); Sybil Ramkin's grandfather led an Ankh-Morporkian army expedition to the continent to seek new enemies, and may have fought a battle at''Lawkes' Drain''; two elephant-wranglers brought a thousand elephants all the way out of Howondaland; a teacher at the Assasins' Guild school may hail from a "White Howondaland" not unlike Rhodesia or the old South Africa; and in ''Snuff'' we see Precious Jolson travel "home" to find her roots, and we have Gravid rust's ttropical tobacco farm worked by slaves...

The dwarfs in ''Thud!'' didn't dare leave the drawing of the Summoning Dark symbol in darkness, surrounding it with candles all night lest it "escape" and cause harm. The sensible solution would've been to destroy the drawing, yet their culture is staunchly against the erasure of writing in any form. By declaring Vimes' title as "Blackboard Monitor" to be official, the Low King may well have been endowing him with the legitimate right to break that stricture on dwarfdom's behalf, so that the Commander -- the only person ever known to have [[{{Determinator}} defied and suppressed]] the Summoning Dark's influence -- could ''personally'' destroy any such symbols that turned up. Thus, the king and the Commander could protect others from its contagion, without having to spend a fortune on candles or violate dwarf custom.

** Not to mention the frequently noted odd smell.

The dwarfs in ''Thud!'' didn't dare leave the drawing of the Summoning Dark symbol in darkness, surrounding it with candles all night lest it "escape" and cause harm. The sensible solution would've been to destroy the drawing, yet their culture is staunchly against the erasure of writing in any form. By declaring Vimes' title as "Blackboard Monitor" to be official, the Low King may well have been endowing him with the legitimate right to break that stricture on dwarfdom's behalf, so that the Commander -- the only person ever known to have [[{{Determinator}} defied and suppressed]] the Summoning Dark's influence -- could ''personally'' destroy any such symbols that turned up, thus protecting others from its contagion.