Ok, so Thursday I'll be teaching Terry Pratchett's "Guards Guards" to my fairly high-brow literary students.
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I just finished reading Guards! Guards! for the first time about 20 minutes ago. I've been recommended it many times over the years but only finally got to it.
Your highbrow literary students ought to have plenty to say about it as a satire and parable of world politics, especially contemporary politics. Amoral elites in a power struggle with other elites appeal to the basest impulses of stupid and shortsighted petit-bourgeois to summon a gold-obsessed monster which immediately turns on them and installs itself as king while murdering the populace, all while much of the public decides to be fine with it. It couldn't be more apt if Pratchett had written it today.
Absolutely agree.
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I just finished reading Guards! Guards! for the first time about 20 minutes ago. I've been recommended it many times over the years but only finally got to it.
Your highbrow literary students ought to have plenty to say about it as a satire and parable of world politics, especially contemporary politics. Amoral elites in a power struggle with other elites appeal to the basest impulses of stupid and shortsighted petit-bourgeois to summon a gold-obsessed monster which immediately turns on them and installs itself as king while murdering the populace, all while much of the public decides to be fine with it. It couldn't be more apt if Pratchett had written it today.
@biogeo @SuneAuken Sir Terry Pratchett were magnificent. RIP.
IMHO the guards books are all great. Apart from that I can recommend Moving Pictures, The Truth & Going Postal. The latter being his finest work. -
Forgive the igoramus here. What does ABAC stand for? I can't seem to find the right meaning in a search.
@SuneAuken @schmidt_fu All Cops Are Bastards
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@biogeo @SuneAuken Sir Terry Pratchett were magnificent. RIP.
IMHO the guards books are all great. Apart from that I can recommend Moving Pictures, The Truth & Going Postal. The latter being his finest work.Going Postal is great, but not my favorite by some distance. Fortunately, literary quality is not an objective measure and we are actually allowed to be of different opinions.
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@SuneAuken @schmidt_fu All Cops Are Bastards
Ah ok. So "ACAB", nor "ABAC". Explains why I could not find it.
Thank you for explaining. I think seeing the City Watch-series as some kind of Theory of Practical Policing is a valid approach.
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Ok, so Thursday I'll be teaching Terry Pratchett's "Guards! Guards!" to my fairly high-brow literary students. My task will be to show them that it is a wonderful piece of literature.
Personally, I adore it, but it may take a bit of work to get my students around.
Didactic suggestions?
@SuneAuken
Maybe one angle could be how it subverts archetypal story elements. The cardboard-cutout city guard become the main characters; the lone hero with a sword and a Destiny becomes one of a group; the people pushing for a traditional happy ending are the villains and so on. -
Ah ok. So "ACAB", nor "ABAC". Explains why I could not find it.
Thank you for explaining. I think seeing the City Watch-series as some kind of Theory of Practical Policing is a valid approach.
@SuneAuken @schmidt_fu Did I do the acronym for “Attribute-Based Access Control?” Geez. I should not get those two mixed up LOL
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@SuneAuken @schmidt_fu Did I do the acronym for “Attribute-Based Access Control?” Geez. I should not get those two mixed up LOL
Lol.
Yeah. That's what i got too when i searched. I really couldn't match it with Pratchett.
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@SuneAuken
Maybe one angle could be how it subverts archetypal story elements. The cardboard-cutout city guard become the main characters; the lone hero with a sword and a Destiny becomes one of a group; the people pushing for a traditional happy ending are the villains and so on.Yeah. The course is on genre and interpretation so that approach is quite likely to be there too.
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Ok, so Thursday I'll be teaching Terry Pratchett's "Guards! Guards!" to my fairly high-brow literary students. My task will be to show them that it is a wonderful piece of literature.
Personally, I adore it, but it may take a bit of work to get my students around.
Didactic suggestions?
Unseen Academicals
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Ok, so Thursday I'll be teaching Terry Pratchett's "Guards! Guards!" to my fairly high-brow literary students. My task will be to show them that it is a wonderful piece of literature.
Personally, I adore it, but it may take a bit of work to get my students around.
Didactic suggestions?
@SuneAuken Personally I'd be sold on "We're doing Guards! Guards!" but a choice quote might be, "But in cynicism and general world weariness, which is a sort of carbon dating of the personality, he was about seven thousand years old."
- Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards! -
@SuneAuken Personally I'd be sold on "We're doing Guards! Guards!" but a choice quote might be, "But in cynicism and general world weariness, which is a sort of carbon dating of the personality, he was about seven thousand years old."
- Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!@SuneAuken Or
"Several times he had to flatten himself against the shelves as a thesaurus thundered by. He waited patiently as a herd of Critters crawled past, grazing on the contents of the choicer books and leaving behind them piles of small slim volumes of literary criticism."
- Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards! -
Oh, that's hard to choose.
I have a hard time choosing. Also, I'm still down 15 or so of the novels, and I haven't even touched the Witches Series yet.
I have a decided taste for the City Watch-series, and I find myself re-reading them before i read on in the rest of the novels. They use the setting so brilliantly and their loving parody i unmatched.
@SuneAuken Going Postal and The Truth have much of the same vibe as the City Watch series.
They about Newspapers and Journalism, and the rebuilding of the Ankh Morpork postal service. Great stuff
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@SuneAuken Going Postal and The Truth have much of the same vibe as the City Watch series.
They about Newspapers and Journalism, and the rebuilding of the Ankh Morpork postal service. Great stuff
Oh yes, and they interact nicely. "Going Postal" carries on a narrative line started in "Feet of Clay", and as Moist von Lipwick moves up in society he meets other central players.
Sam Vimes is almost as important as von Lipwick in the later "Raising Steam" which by itself is closely connected to "Thud".
- Oh long narrative lines. This i my game ...
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Oh yes, and they interact nicely. "Going Postal" carries on a narrative line started in "Feet of Clay", and as Moist von Lipwick moves up in society he meets other central players.
Sam Vimes is almost as important as von Lipwick in the later "Raising Steam" which by itself is closely connected to "Thud".
- Oh long narrative lines. This i my game ...
I still haven't read "The Truth", but I'll get to it at some point.
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I still haven't read "The Truth", but I'll get to it at some point.
@SuneAuken @jenspoder I dable in journalism so 'The Truth' strikes a chord with me.
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Oh, that's hard to choose.
I have a hard time choosing. Also, I'm still down 15 or so of the novels, and I haven't even touched the Witches Series yet.
I have a decided taste for the City Watch-series, and I find myself re-reading them before i read on in the rest of the novels. They use the setting so brilliantly and their loving parody i unmatched.
Just wait until you get to Soul Music
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Just wait until you get to Soul Music
It's wonderful.
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Lol.
Yeah. That's what i got too when i searched. I really couldn't match it with Pratchett.
@SuneAuken @MisuseCase @schmidt_fu
"couldn't match it with Pratchett"
Ye're a poet and don't know it!
P'terry'd be proud
Great books all, try reading Wee Free Men out aloud for a laugh!
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@SuneAuken @MisuseCase @schmidt_fu
"couldn't match it with Pratchett"
Ye're a poet and don't know it!
P'terry'd be proudGreat books all, try reading Wee Free Men out aloud for a laugh!
Yeah. It's a wonderful book. I always wonder why he abandoned the word "Pictsie" in later books, but Nac Mac Feegle remains ok.
