History Literature / TheTruth

* NotSoDifferent: William and his father, as noted by more than one character, something that deeply infuriates William, who tries very hard to be as unlike his father as possible. Eventually he comes around to it and decides to use it to his advantage.
-->'''William:''' Of all the bone-headed, stubborn, self-centered, arrogant--\\
'''Otto:''' But you make up for it in other vays.\\
'''William:''' I meant my father.
** Otto also points out the similarities between himself and William:
-->"I like [[VampireVords Villiam]]. He was not brought up nice but he tries to be a nice person, vithout even cocoa and a singsong to help him. It is hard to go against your nature. Ve must... [[BigDamnHeroes help him]]."

* YourApprovalFillsMeWithShame: After he figures out the plot against the Patrician, William gives his father some of the jewels taken from Mr. Pin, essentially repaying the cost of raising him and buying himself out of the family, but Lord de Worde tells him to keep it because William is [[NotSoDifferent "most]] ''[[NotSoDifferent certainly]]'' [[NotSoDifferent a de Worde"]].

* NewTechIsNotCheap: An aversion. When the Bursar is tasked with reducing Unseen University's expenses, he wanders into Mr. Goodmountain's new business, and while initially dismissive of the printing press, his attitude takes a much more relaxed attitude when he mentally compares Mr. Goodmountain's rates versus the Guild of Engravers'. With this, and the promise of an invite for a future luncheon, the Bursar immediately offers Mr. Goodmountain Unseen University's business.

* {{Expy}}: Mr. Tulip and Mr. Pin are definitely Expies of Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar from ''Literature/{{Neverwhere}}'', but to what extent is debatable. Both duos are examples of [[ThoseTwoBadGuys a common archetype]], but their ''name'' is an undeniable ShoutOut[[note]]Tulip and Pin refer to themselves as "The New Firm," an obvious contrast to Croup and Vandemar's Old Firm[[/note]], so it's likely Pratchett took influence from them.

* ThoseTwoBadGuys: Mr Pin and Mr Tulip.

* RunningGag: Mr. Wintler and his humorously shaped vegetables, Sacharissa's chest size, typos of "The Truth Shall Make You Free", Mr. Tulip's abuse of the phrase [[UnusualEuphemism "——ing"]] and bad habit of getting stuck with {{Beat Bag}}s.

* BeatBag: Tulip never manages to buy any real drugs.
-->In a street where furtive people were selling Clang, Slap, Chop, Rhino, Skunk, Triplin, Floats, Honk, Double Honk, Gongers, and Slack, Mr. Tulip had an unerring way of finding the man who was retailing curry powder at what worked out as six hundred dollars a pound.

* FakeHigh: Mr. Tulip [[BeatBag never seems to get his hands on real drugs]], but that doesn't stop him from claiming it keeps his mind sharp.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: "Spit or swallow, the eternal conundrum."
** Gaspode's informant-alias of [[spoiler: Deep Bone]] qualifies, provided you know that [[spoiler: the original Deep Throat of the Watergate scandal had based ''his'' alias on the title of a porno movie.]]

** Mr Tulip describes a musical instrument thusly: "It's not a —ing harpsichord, it's a —ing virginal. One —ing string to a note instead of two! So called because it was an instrument for —ing young ladies!" to which the response is "My word, was it? I thought it was just of sort of early piano!" (also qualifies as GettingCrapPastTheRadar. See also VerbalTic below).

** When the Times is burnt out after an attack, it has nowhere to print its findings. Compare this to one of the myriad sub-plots of Robert Shea and Creator/RobertAntonWilson's ''Literature/{{Illuminatus}}'', where the radical magazine and thorn in the flesh of the Establishment, "Confrontation", is suddenly bombed, apparently to prevent it publishing further inconvenient truths. In fact, this bombing draws in the hard-bitten cynical street coppers Goodman and Muldoon as investigators, just as in Discworld Vimes and Carrot are among the first to the wreckage of the Times printworks. Another link: Confrontation's Arab-American editor Joseph Malik kept rare Egyptian tropical fish in the office to remind him of home. These died in the bombing. The Times' Überwaldean photographer Otto Chriek kept Überwaldean land-eels, another rare fish species from Home, which were lost in the bombing... And earlier in the book, Saharissa is asked, on a scale of one to ten, exactly how much trouble she estimates they're in. William thinks eight. Sacharissa reflects and says ''two thousand, three hundred and seventeen out of ten''. 23 and 17 are the all-important continually repeating ArcNumber s of the ''Illuminatus!'' trilogy.

-->'''Sacharissa:''' What's true for most people is that they need money for food on the table at the end o the day. Look at Mr Ron and his friends, they live under a bridge, what's the truth worth to them? I get letters from a bird competition judge who complains that budgies and parrots aren't the same. It's dull, but it's important to HIM. He can't control what happens in the city, but he can make sure budgies and parrots aren't lumped together. It's not anyone's fault, it's just the way things are.

-->'''Sacharissa''' What's true for most people is that they need money for food on the table at the end o the day. Look at Mr Ron and his friends, they live under a bridge, what's the truth worth to them? I get letters from a bird competition judge who complains that budgies and parrots aren't the same. It's dull, but it's important to HIM. He can't control what happens in the city, but he can make sure budgies and parrots aren't lumped together. It's not anyone's fault, it's just the way things are.

* {{Expy}}: Mr. Tulip and Mr. Pin are definitely Expies of Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar from ''Literature/Neverwhere'', but to what extent is debatable. Both duos are examples of [[ThoseTwoBadGuys a common archetype]], but their ''name'' is an undeniable ShoutOut[[note]]Tulip and Pin refer to themselves as "The New Firm," an obvious contrast to Croup and Vandemar's Old Firm[[/note]], so it's likely Pratchett took influence from them.

* RealityEnsues: Wlliam had started out in charge of the Times in the hope that it would get peoples' attention about the truth and they could do something about it. Sacharissa points out to him that life doesn't work like that.

* BadDreams: Tulip has them.

* SmallNameBigEgo: Mr. Tulip and Mr. Pin, big time. They believe they are absolutely the latest, greatest thing in crime and that Ankh-Morpork's underworld is full of lily-livered amateurs. They never catch on that Ankh-Morpork is to evil and corruption what guns are to bullets and the only reason the city's criminals no longer try to upset the status quo is that is they're up against two of the most fearsome forces on the Disc: [[MagnificentBastard Vetinari's intelligence]] and [[TheFettered Sam Vimes's dedication to the law]].

** Immediately after, when Otto has freaked Cheery out by taking an obscurograph, William asks him why the dark light upset her and notices that Otto only says it has no ''physical'' effects. In

* ExactWords: Tuttle Scrope, who was earmarked [[spoiler:to replace Vetinari]], is head of the Guild of Shoemakers, Cobblers and Leatherworkers. His shop sells [[spoiler:what sounds very much like leather fetish wear.]]
** William says to Nobby, "I've just spoken to Commander Vimes and now I would like to see the room where the crime was committed." This sentence "seems to contain the phrase 'and he gave me permission to' without actually doing so." (William refuses to tell lies, so he has to resort to this trope.)

* HaveIMentionedIAmADwarfToday: One of the other residents opens his boiled egg... with a precise blow from a very small axe after hearing a racist remark from Mr. Windling. It illustrates how persistently foolish Mr. Windling must be, as there are mentions of the preparations for opening the boiled egg throughout the scene.

* DarkAndTroubledPast: Mr. Tulip comes from a war-ravaged region. With a little prompting from Death, he later realizes that his pseudo-religous mantra about everything being alright if you have a potato was something that someone said in reference to food needed to avoid starvation while the people of his village were hiding in a basement from ''both'' armies (due to both bing equally threatening to the common folk). His level of depravation and desperation later in life (before join gin up with Mr. Pin) doesn't; seem to have been any better. The first person he ever killed was a man whose coat he was trying to steal

* DarkAndTroubledPast: Mr. Tulip comes from a war-ravaged region With a little prompting from Death, he later realizes that his pseudo-religous mantra about everything being alright if you have a potato was something that someone said in reference to food needed to avoid starvation while the people of his village were hiding in a basement from ''both'' armies (due to both bing equally threatening to the common folk). His level of depravation and desperation later in life (before join gin up with Mr. Pin) doesn't; seem to have been any better. The first person he ever killed was a man whose coat he was trying to steal