Why isn't Terry Pratchett dead?

I got Estie's back on this one

Don't you mean, why aren't his fans dead? He can't help them being like that, surely!

We deal with illnesses, not symptoms

"ILX - We deal with illnesses, not symptoms"

Hmmm, I like it.

This is a good strategy.

You must be so happy he's got Alzheimers

In Pratchett's defence, Douglas Adams was a lot worse

And he is dead, so that's fine then

My d&d cousin bought me some Pratchett about 8 yrs ago, I think it's still around, i should jettison it.

Douglas Adams non-ironic love of Dire Straits sort of cancels a lot of fan-nerd results out.

Can you translate that last sentence into English?

Terry Pratchett did write a wonderful book about cats though. And Douglas Adams is awesome, a most humanist absurdist, dude.

Can you translate that last sentence into English?

He was a dude and I mean that in the most-80s sweatband wearing sense.

terry prat-chett more like

this thread would get more posts if pratchett had crashed in a rocket sled or something

ILX Prats Chat Pratchett

*clap*

if terry pratchett died of the clap, that would be a good story. more importantly, it would be a new story, something he hasn't come up with in years.

i still like him though, he was very waffly at a book signing i met him at once.

RIP

Big Man

look, it's so cute, they even finish each other's posts now.

OK, that's disturbing.

heaven needed a new darramous to ban

Results 1 - 10 of about 36,500 for neckbeard. (0.18 seconds)

I love the "kick a man while he's down" spirit of ILX. It's just so heartwarming, isn't it?

I do hope Alzheimer's doesn't stop him from writing his hilarious seven page footnotes consisting of shit fantasy novel gags. Those are pretty lulz.

55 million sales would seem to suggest a market for that kind of thing, can you blame the guy?

cf 'mein kampf'

RIP Ike Turner, but lol Terry Pratchett has Alzheimers

Inventing rock n roll > Truckers

"He is currently the second most read writer in the UK"

Yeah I'd say he was doing something right.

xp, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma

"Yeah I'd say he was doing something right."

uh?

number one is probably jeremy clarkson. this is a country of shitheads.

J. K. Rowling

I thought the most *read* author in the UK was Jacqueline Wilson?

J. K. Rowling

worse than i had even envisaged.

moan moan moan, i dunno.

Jacqueline Wilson is a decent author, I'd take her over Pratchett

this is a country of shitheads.

wow tell us something new.

he's seventh in the US.

lol roffling at the afflicted
http://www.vauxhallsociety.org.uk/Bedlam.jpg
lol corrosive cynicism
lol writing some nerdy S&S novels = you are hitler
lol why can't i stop laughing and laughing and laughing.
lolololololo

(cough)

Terry Pratchett should do one of his intelligent and witty SATIREZ OF REAL WORLD STUFF in his next novel, but instead of it being a message board it could be a dwarf's beard.

it's a dicksworld :-(

booby sands, now there's a great writer, eh?

fuck ilx today

i don't get why it took 24 hours for someone to get upset over this thread

TS: Terry Pratchett vs Richard Hammond

oh this thread has some way to go before it can match that classic

i mean you haven't ben threatened with death by a mod yet

i don't get why it took 24 hours for someone to get upset over this thread

it is a bit cuntish though, isn't it? "let's all laugh at someone who has developed alzheimer's because we think his books are shit"

Man, it's so hard not to act reckless
To whom much is given, much is tested
Get arrested, guess until he get the message
I feel the pressure, under more scrutiny
And what'd I do? Act more stupidly

I really liked the redemption arc with Vimes but he's getting a little stale now.

I'm amazed that after 8 months this thread isn't full of irate Pratchett googlers.

Never read his books but seems like a nice guy doing his campaigning for alzheimers. Watched that Hogfather thing with David Jason and that was enough to put me off reading them for life.

That was utter shite compared to his books, and I'm not a megafan or anything. Though I remember Hogfather the novel being a bit all over the place.

It was, but the build to the climax was fantastic.

The hogfather adaptation was bad some nice ideas in it but still not great. the colour of magic one was unwatchably awful.

xpost
The Hogfather book is a bit of a mess and the TV adaptation managed to rob the story of any of it's redeeming features by taking the book too literally and too seriously.
I like most of the books mentioned in HI DERE's list, but I really don't get along with the Rincewind books. I would very much recommend Night Watch, which vies for his best book with Small Gods.

The only reason I didn't add Night Watch is because it practically requires reading and loving all of the other City Watch books in order to appreciate it fully, and I will never, ever, willingly make someone read Jingo.

The Rincewind books were my favourites, I liked how they mostly had an episodic, heroic quest structure. I particularly enjoyed Interesting Times. The non-Rincewind one I remember liking the most was Small Gods.

Yeah, Interesting Times is definitely the best of the Rincewind books. The Last Continent is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO bad, though.

I think I would have liked The Fifth Elephant more had it not been named The Fifth Elephant.

Oh, and the Death books were always good.

This is a horrible thread and yet somehow completely appropriate. Pratchett making a compelling case for the right to die:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/feb/02/terry-pratchett-assisted-suicide-tribunal

You mean a horribly good thread.

I won't stand in the way of any Pratchett fans wanting to commit voluntary euthanasia btw.

they might decide you'd make a perfect test case for assisted euthanasia, watch out

yeah,

Here come the Pratchett fans!
euthanasia books in their hands...

What are these "Pratchet fans" like, other than Aussie pawn shop owners and Boston opera stars? I guess I just don't understand.

there was this too: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00qmfgn/Richard_Dimbleby_Lecture_Shaking_Hands_with_Death/

so much truth earlier in this thread

Ward Fowler wrote this on thread 100 Actual Worst Writers Of All Time on board I Love Everything on 04-Feb-2009

41 terry pratchett smug, unfunny, reactionary, in the grand tradition of iris murdoch

re-reading Good Omens at them moment (written with Neil Gaiman) and it's probably his best work?

Discworld best- Anything with the city watch, Small Gods, Interesting Times

Good Omens is arguably the best work either writer has done.

^^

his foreword and end notes (to good omens) make me think that he'd be an a+ senior ilxor.

darraghmac OTM re: good Pratchett; I'm also partial to Maskerade if only for the opera/musical jokes

oh, except Jingo wasn't very good IIRC

His later work suffers from being reproductions of earlier stuff, just on different themes, and yeah Jingo more than most. Still as easy to read as anyone out there in fiction, but harder to love any of his stuff since maybe Feet of Clay onwards.

boy/girl discovers magic device/power- stock cast of wizards/witches/monks sort it out

crime/corruption- stock cast of watch/vetinari sort it out

If I'm honest, I'd love to see him go back to a Colour of Magic pastiche of straight fantasy narrative rather than the almost montage style of stock characters he's tended to use since ?the late 90's? onwards.

Did I mention that he's at least as nice as you'd expect in person, even if he did sign a book for my younger brother 'To a great big best brother', rather confusingly.

Although there is little doubt that after 5 hours of queueing for him on a day where I was actually meant to be taking my girlfriend shopping but spotted he was signing books, I deserved the title.

Monstrous Regiment was pretty good, as was Going Postal. (Making Money seemed like it was treading water again.)

The Wee Free Men and A Hat Full Of Sky were also good; haven't gotten to Wintersmith yet.

I heart the Tiffany Aching series/trilogy Wee Free Men, Hatful of Sky, and whatever -- oh, Wintersmith, which I believe were halfway intended for young adult readers so the jokey over-statey tone is really mellowed in a paternal narrator way. I dunno, I think it works.

xxxp although I can't stick the witches as a rule, yeah Maskerade is great.

I think I've read Wintersmith. Not knowing for sure is pretty damning in itself.

I sort of feel like he should have left the Witches alone after Maskerade; there was nowhere he could really go except down from that story.

He's gotta tackle Carrot before he goes, unless that's been dealt with in one of the City tales I've missed? That would actually be an awesome signoff for Discworld.

Am now imagining a Steven Erikson/George RRRRRR Martin host authored post-pratchett-mortem finish to the series, where Carrot challenges Vetinari and massive bloodshed and suffering ensues.

is this how fanfic starts

TURN BACK NOW

I read Nation (his newest YA book) a few weeks ago - like the Tiffany Aching books, much less of the ott jokey punster stuff. Also deals with devastating loss and a "blue lagoon" scenario in unexpectedly pragmatic ways.

I probably would have enjoyed Unseen Academicals more if I were a soccer fan, but it was fine airport/travel reading regardless.

The other trilogy he did for younger readers (the Bromeliad) was dull and dreadful.

I haven't even SEEN UA in bookstores around here!

I Kindled it back in September but saved it for vacation reading. The paperback isn't out until June.

He is now.

thinking the bloke deserved a better thread than this maybe, not read any of his books since i was about 12 though

Well yes, I'm sure someone will come up with a more appropriate one but this was top for the search and it was impossible to resist.

Terry pratchet was a man? Huh

Definitely deserves better. I've never read his books, but when he was diagnosed with the same unusual variant of Alzheimer's as my (now late) father, his openness about his condition was extremely valuable. He and Glen Campbell the last few years, it's very unusual for someone with Alzheimer's to readily admit it and raise awareness before it gets too far down the line. RIP.

https://vimeo.com/24875580

RIP

He was a very good very sharp humorist, obviously too twee for many but miles miles beyond something like Xanth

RIP, I loved Good Omens when I was a kid.

will always remind me of being about ten years old and laughing with my best friends

haven't looked at a pratchett book in 20 years or more but i loved the early discworld stuff as a kid and he was really kind to me when i met him as an over-eager 10-year-old at a book festival. his attitude in the face of alzheimer's was amazingly brave and entirely admirable.

Feeling some kind of way about finding out that dm is a fellow fan, might probe that on another day, but this isn't another day, c'mere big man.

Men at Arms is an odd one, second in a series should be a let down, but all the different plots hit it, and maybe I just love it because it's the point at which is became clear to me that Sam Vimes will be his signature character.

Thief of Time is the other one I out-and-out loved, always easy to do "Plucky human ingenuity vs the faceless forces of order", but he again gets all the details of why being human is a really awkward situation that most of the time everyone is trying to get out of, there's a massive humanist joy in there.

I would say (because I have no fear of sounding stupid in public) that for at the last 20 years he's been the best living English writer - not of the language, or of those holding the passport, but the best at capturing a non-vicious national character (tho he could do vicious as well, Little Englanders and racists and the close-minded) - the written equivalent of Billy Bragg's England, Half English. He genuinely seemed to love the human condition. (NB I have no idea how to reconcile those two ideas)

Terry Pratchett @terryandrob · 57m 57 minutes ago
AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER.

Terry Pratchett @terryandrob · 57m 57 minutes ago
Terry took Death’s arm and followed him through the doors and on to the black desert under the endless night.

Terry Pratchett @terryandrob · 56m 56 minutes ago
The End.