#we need to be like Vimes and watch ourselves

[worrywrite]

I'm still trying to wrap my mind around Men at Arms.

It's a fantastic book, but it is also so different from Guards! Guards! in tone. And maybe that's where the key is. It's not that the villain of the story is perhaps one of the most proficient killers in all of Discworld (all two and a half of them... D'Eath, Cruces, and The Gonne) and their goal is to actually kill. It's not even that the crimes that the watch are investigating are murder, because even though paid assassinations are legal death and murder are part of the setting. Death is literally a character here, though much more briefly than G!G!. Frankly, I don't even think it's because of the racial allegories.

The tone in Men at Arms is different because the first one to die is a clown. Because Pratchett literally killed the joke (the entire thing and all of its subsets). There's nothing funny about a clown funeral, the dogs are the biggest allegory for racial issues, a gun really is evil, Cuddy literally draws the short straw. It's all literal. Everything is extremely literal. For once, Ankh Morpork isn't a joke. For once, the city feels like a city. And it's the book where Carrot, the most literal character there is, becomes a man (literally and in every sense) and takes his mantle of leadership.

Everything in Men at Arms is literal. Because the villain killed the joke to death and it was the shining moment for Carrot to step up.

There's also an extensive running bit that even the silly construction of the silly, courtesy of Bloody Stupid Johnson, is actually stupid. Within the narrative itself, the book is calling itself out. It is saying that this absurd veneer that we have found ourselves on is just that. This city was built on itself, on its own bones, on the the bones of empires--fueled with the blood of many. The architecture beneath Johnson's flawed works, the aqueducts and sewer systems below the city, are vast and strong and powerful--maybe even beautiful. But they're dangerous. The past is incredibly dangerous. Even Carrot, whose potential is very much rooted in the past of the city, is dangerous. His victory is not one I expected in the moment it came. The line about how you must hope that whoever is looking at you from the other end of their weapon is an evil man... Was harsh and true and honestly a little frightening for a story which also contains a scene where a sentient rock man chucks a dwarf through the skylight of Schrodinger's pork warehouse to save both of their lives.

Perhaps this puts the rest of the book in context as well. Especially the things that made me cringe when I read them. Like everything about Coalface, Angua being included in the story because she was a woman and every book needs at least one (preferably one that can leap over a building or deadlift a draft horse), the high school clique-ificarion of all the guilds, Vimes talkin to the nobles after dinner and almost letting himself believe he could be like that (even though he ends up laying into them with some excellent biting sarcasm), Vetinari not being in control and not realizing it. It's all very real, but real like a real serial killer in real life and not a crime drama. Maybe even real like a normal guy in a costume with their mask off.

Maybe not.

It's not a perfect book (which bites, because G!G! was nearly there), but it remains a very intentional book. I feel like less people have read it than G!G!, and I can see why. It's messier, it's not as funny, there's a lot more allegory and it's a lot more blunt.

But it's still extremely topical (sadly). I retain my opinion that it may be one of the most important books I've ever read. And I'm beginning to understand, finally, why.

[lamuradex]

Discworld Fanfic: The Other Trouser Leg

Based on Jingo, it tells the story of the other Vimes.

Wordcount: 3065

In Jingo, Sam Vimes' Dis-Organiser begins to malfunction, getting confused and giving him the schedule of the Vimes who stayed behind in Ankh-Morpork. He hears the horrors of what could have been. He hears as the Dis-Organiser reports the deaths of his men.

But, in theory, another Vimes would have gotten his schedule. A Vimes who was having a much worse day.

Please enjoy this tragic fanfiction.

The Other Trouser Leg

Vimes wandered down the street, puffing on a cigar. It wasn’t his usual walk. And even if it was, it hadn’t been for a while. The ceremonial truncheon in his belt saw to that. But someone needed to make sure this all didn’t go to-

Bingley-Bingley-Beep

Vimes groaned. “What is it now, you blasted thing?” he swore as he pulled out the Dis-organiser.

“6:34am Meeting with 71-Hour Ahmed in ruins of Tacticum,” the demon wittered, though it sounded unsure of itself.

“What are you on about?” Vimes stared at it. “I’ve never even heard of Tacticum, and why would I be meeting with that madman Ahmed?”

“Um… I don’t know…” the demon confessed, then went back inside the box.

Vimes put it away and got back to what he was doing. Organising the supplies to build defences. Someone had to, and Vetinari was gone, Lord Rust was abroad, thankfully, so there was only The Watch Regiment left to oversee things.

Captain Carrot, meanwhile, had essentially left by himself to get Angua. He’d come back to inform everyone of the mission, unlike any other valiant rescue in history, but Vimes had let him go. He’d wanted to follow. He’d been moments from sodding this whole war effort and leaving. But someone reminded him he was needed here. He was Commander of the Watch, and both Sybil and Carrot said he needed to delegate more.

So he had. Carrot would rescue Angua. Meanwhile he’d stay and look after Ankh-Morpork.

The decision didn’t sit right though. He should have been in the thick of it. Going after his corporal. Going after that bastard Ahmed. And the damned Dis-Organiser hadn’t been working all day. Less than usual. It was like it was giving him someone else’s appointments.

It was strange too, because Nobby and Colon had gone missing. So, with all his best men down, though best felt like an odd term, he had to take up the command himself.

So much for delegation.

“Alright!” he yelled to Detritus, who was carrying an entire cart of lumber rather than pulling it. “You, put the wood over there. We can make barricades along the roads.”

“And what should we be doing, sir?” said the smooth voice of Constable Visit beside him.

“Keep fighting to a minimum before the actual fighting starts,” Vimes commanded. “People might not be happy we’re blocking up their streets. And you, Littlebottom.” He looked around, then looked down.

“Yes, sir?” she answered.

“Make sure the barricades are being built. We put some of the dwarves on it, but you know how ornery they can get.”

“Yes, sir,” she agreed and hurried off.

Everything was going to plan… and that worried Vimes a little.

* * *

The barricades and many other defences were built. Fences and walls and barriers. It all looked a bit ramshackle, it was Ankh-Morpork workmanship after all, but hopefully it would hold.

Vimes wasn’t massively hopeful. All the same, men and women milled about, weapons readied, as Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler went about selling sausages to the troops. Some of them were even nervous enough to buy one.

Bingley-Bingley-Beep

Vimes groaned, but took out the Dis-Organiser anyway. “What is it now?”

“7:00am. Charging the armies of Klatch and Ankh-Morpork,” the demon said, stuttering slightly.

“But we’re Ankh Morpork. Why would we be charging ourselves?” Vimes asked, hoping to make the demon see sense.

It didn’t. The imp merely flapped its mouth a moment, scrunched up its lips, then gave up and vanished.

“Bloody thing,” Vimes cursed.

“Commander!” came a cry from the docks.

Vimes hurried down, not quite running, not quite strolling. It didn’t do to show how nervous he was. He even lit a cigar to show how casual he was being. Remarkably, it wasn’t an attack. A boat had pulled up to a jetty by the river gate. A boat with two occupants.

“Good morning, Commander Vimes,” Captain Carrot greeted brightly, stepping off the boat. “How goes everything here?”

“Captain?” Vimes stared in befuddlement. “What are you doing back?”

“Oh, mission accomplished, sir,” he said officially. Behind him, Angua stepped off the boat.

“But… how?” Vimes spluttered. “She was on 71-Hour Ahmed’s ship, wasn’t she?”

“Yes, sir. But when I got to Klatch, she was waiting by the shoreline. Says a metal spike poked through the bottom of the boat, she broke free, then she swam to shore. Ahmed’s people never came after her.”

“Wish he had, the little…” Angua trailed off, rubbing a red band on her neck.

“Well… Impressive, Captain. And you too, Corporal,” Vimes floundered.

“Thank you, sir,” the pair answered.

“Now, if we can just tighten up everything, we might be-”

“Sir?” Captain Carrot held up a hand politely.

“What is it, Captain?”

“We might have been spotted as we left Klatch,” Carrot said worriedly. He pointed out to sea. “It seems they might have followed us.”

Vimes followed his finger. He stared out to sea. The cigar fell from his mouth.

The horizon looked like a small forest. One in winter without a single leaf, as a field of masts poked up over the horizon. Hundreds of them.

* * *

Bingley-Bingley-Beep

“Everyone, fall back! Get to Sator Square! Shore up the defences!” Vimes yelled.

“7:48am. Meet with Prince Cadram and Lord Rust.”

“Just shut up, you daft thing!” 

It had all gone wrong. It had all gone wrong so quickly.

The boats had arrived on mass, with Morpork’s own navy having left with Lord Rust. Nets had been put up to stop them at the river gate, but the Klatchians cut straight through. The people of Ankh-Morpork were used to a scrap, but that was mostly broken bottles in taverns. Actual organised fighting was outside their comfort zone, and it showed. People ran, abandoned their posts. Others got stuck in, and immediately killed. The Klatchians were organised. With a shout of Klatchian words, presumably “For Prince Cadram” or some such, they were in the ports, in the streets, and cutting down anyone in their path. Vimes had been forced back with everyone else, fighting his way up Peach Pie Street with a sword and his ceremonial truncheon. The Dis-Organiser had also taken that moment to say he should be fighting enemy soldiers alongside 71-Hour Ahmed, so now he was sure it was broken.

But every armed man had met the Klatchians at the river gate. Now every armed man was falling back, with Vimes desperately trying to hold everything together.

Sator Square was a good gathering place, but it wasn’t exactly a defensible position. Too many entrances, too many paths, too many rooftops. But as soldier and civilian alike ran for their lives, it was still a good place for everyone to gather.

There weren’t as many people as there should have been.

“Alright everyone, we can hold our ground,” Vimes called to everyone. “Carrot, Angua, make sure there’s a man on every road in. Warn us if anyone’s coming. Detritus? If you hear someone call out, open fire. That should scare them.”

There was a clang as Detritus saluted, then he hefted his siege bow into the best spot.

“Everyone else! Build up those barricades. We need a way out, so suggestions are welcome.”

He had run this way hoping for a better way out. Perhaps to head into the Unseen University. Unfortunately the gates were sealed. Locked, bolted, and likely enchanted. Wizards didn’t do war, and that may have been a good thing. The palace was the next best bet, but that was some distance. Then there was the Watch House, but it would be a bit cramped with so many. But in terms of buildings they could defend…

Bingley-Bingley-Beep

“Thing to do today: Arrest Enemy Armies.”

“Enemy sighted!”

THWACK

Detritus had done as instructed, and fired a bolt like an oar down a road. The Klatchian at the other end would have been pinned to the wall, if the arrow had stopped. It was likely two streets over by now, even as Detritus reloaded.

“Fall back!” Vimes yelled. The Watch House it would have to be.

A crowd of terrified people, and rightfully nervous soldiers, and even more anxious guards all hurtled across town. Klatchian patrols surged along parallel streets, the sights of scimitars and turbans down most alleys. Vimes stopped at the Watch House door, and funnelled people inside. A few civilians, though most kept running. Some of the soldiers, though many were dead. Each of The Watch fled inside, some dragging injured people with them. Detritus was last, firing one last bolt up the street, and taking out eight men with one shot. Once the troll was in, Vimes closed the door and barred it.

This wasn’t a plan, hiding in the Watch House. They should be out there helping. But they’d really be out there dying. He counted off his corporals, his sergeants, his captain. Still no sign of Nobby or Colon, but there wasn’t time to worry. He just had to hope they were safe.

He even hoped Nobby was safe. It was an odd realisation.

He got back to the problem at hand. The enemy were literally at the door. Part of him cried out that they shouldn’t have an enemy. That Klatch was no better than them. But this thinking wasn’t helpful right now. He stressed for a plan. He needed a plan.

The wood of the front door began to bend, as shoulders battered it from the other side.

“Dorfl!” he called out. “Hold that door shut!”

“Yes, Commander,” the golem appeared, pressing his clay body against the door.

“Cheery?” Vimes beckoned.

“Yes, sir?” the dwarf emerged from a side room, axe in hand.

“Anything alchemical we can use? Burning, acid, lightning if you can make it.”

“I’ll do my best, sir.” She darted into her lab, which was an old latrine.

“Carrot?”

“Yes, sir,” the Captain was helping some civilians who’d followed them in.

“You’re one of our best fighters. Any weapons you can find. Arm everyone.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And Angua-”

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. Force ceasefire of Klatchian War.”

“Would you shut up?!”

CRASH!

There was a smashing sound. The sound of masonry. Brick and stone and-

BOOM!

The door to the alchemy lab exploded, the wall behind it demolished. A small shape, axe still in her hand, launched through the door and landed with an unpleasant crunch at Vimes’ feet. There was a dent in her helmet like a hammer had hit it.

“Sir…” she gasped, as the last air left her lungs.

“Cheery!” Angua screamed.

“You make big mistake!” Detritus roared. As he charged, three Klatchians came through the broken door. One of them was about half the troll’s size and wielding a sledge hammer.

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. Welcome Vetinari for peace talks.”

“Detritus, wait!” Vimes yelled. But it was too late.

Detritus charged and grabbed the two men to either side. The one in the middle leapt clear. He then reeled back his sledgehammer and brought it down on Detritus’s skull.

“NO!”

Bits of stone fell like shrapnel to the floor, as Detritus collapsed onto the last man, crushing him. But there were more. A dozen more, all pouring through the gap.

“Upstairs now! Everyone!” Vimes yelled.

Everyone sprinted up the stairs. Surging past him, he counted them off as they passed. In the lobby, he saw Reg Shoe struggling to help Dorfl with the front door, only to get pinned to the wall with a scimitar, which barely seemed to inconvenience the man. Constable Visit came sprinting, a sword in one hand and pamphlets in the other. An arrow whistled past his ear and embedded in the stairs, with Visit veering to avoid it. He missed the stairs and wound up around the corner… where there were more Klatchians.

“Sirs, have you considered leaving your false religions and accepting the love and care of Om?” Vimes heard him say.

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. Watch Captain Carrot’s Football Match between Klatch and Ankh Morpork.”

There was a gurgling gasp.

He’d been trying to convert them to the end. Vimes could almost respect that.

“Dorfl!” he yelled to the golem.

Dorfl answered, moving away from the door to follow. This proved a mistake, as the door collapsed and three men with hammers followed the golem in.

“Behind you!”

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. Meet with Sergeant Colon and Betty.”

The hammers came down and took off Dorfl’s arm. He kept fighting, but two hammers took out a leg. As he balanced, the three hammers synchronised and met either side of his ceramic skull.

“Blast it all!” Vimes swore and sprinted upstairs, Klatchians hurrying towards him.

He hurried up a flight and found Carrot and Angua waiting. They had a large table, and bookcase, and pushed them down the moment Vimes was past. The furniture hurtled down and crushed three Klatchians on their way up.

“Where now, sir?” Carrot asked, somehow not sounding panicked.

“I… I don’t know. Up. Out my office window,” Vimes guessed. It had all gone so wrong.

They sprinted to the top floor, and towards Vimes’ office. Below, the bookcase had been made short work of, and the table thrown aside. Footsteps were running up behind them, and as they rounded a landing, a stray arrow flew up from below. It caught Angua across the arm, sizzling as it did.

“Silver! Bloody silver!” she swore. “71-Hour Ahmed had it too. They’ve done their research.”

“You two, get in there. I’ll hold them off,” Carrot said calmly. In the confusion he’d picked up Cheery’s axe, which while usually quite the faux pas in dwarf circles, didn’t seem to bother him too much here. He’d also drawn his sword, wielding both, standing wide across the corridor.

“Captain! Don’t be a fool!” Vimes ordered.

The footsteps were getting closer. Carrot tensed and readied.

“Captain!”

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. Return home to Ankh-Morpork,” the demon chimed like a death knell.

Vimes’ heart sank. He could see the horrible pattern unfolding around him. Carrot turned, gave him one last nod, and then charged at his approaching enemy, screaming like a dwarf.

“Carrot!” Angua leapt towards him, only to find Vimes’ arm around her waist, dragging her into the office. She struggled, but he threw her in, then bolted and barred the door with a chair.

“We need to go,” Vimes growled, marching to the window.

“But Carrot-”

“He’s dead. They’re all dead,” Vimes hissed. “They’re all dead because of that damned island. Because of this damned war. Because of-”

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. To do today-”

“AND YOU CAN SHUT UP AND ALL!” He hurled the Dis-Organiser at the wall, its case splintering against the brickwork.

He marched to the window and looked down. There were soldiers all over the yard, the street, and every one of them had gathered around the building. There was no way out. He looked back into the office, where Angua was on the floor. She looked like she should be weeping, but she was just staring at the door.

“That stupid, stupid, hero of a man,” she cursed him, eyes filling with tears. “Always having to do the right thing.”

Vimes slammed his hands into his desk. No way out. No hope. No survival. And then his eye landed on the Dis-Organiser. The broken, confused, annoying little…

Like a parting cloud, like the eye of the storm, he remembered. He’d been in this room. He’d had a choice to make. And after that, the Dis-Organiser had been wrong. Something about that moment. That choice.

He nearly didn’t stay. What if he’d have gone instead of staying?

They might still be alive.

Vimes breathed a sigh. In a way, being doomed felt quite liberating. No way of changing it, no more worries, no more reason to panic. There was just whatever life he had left to live.

But he did still have responsibilities.

“Angua,” he addressed, pulling her off the floor.

She couldn’t answer.

“I need you to get out of here. Find Sybil. Find Vetinari. Find anyone really, make sure they’re okay.”

“What about you? I can fight?” she tried to rally. She failed.

“With silver in their weapons, you’re as mortal as me. But you’re faster than me. You can get out that window and get away. I need you to find them, Angua. Maybe there’s hope yet.”

Angua went to argue, but couldn’t. She just looked him sadly in the eye.

“But what about you?” she finally said.

Vimes nodded. He looked over to the broken device on the floor.

“Dis-Organiser?” he beckoned.

“Y-Y-Yes, Insert New User Here?”

“To Do List.”

“Please enter To Do List.”

“To Do Today: Die.”

The machine gave a little affirming beep then fell silent.

Angua just nodded. As Vimes approached the door, there was a noise, and when he looked back there was a wolf at the window. With its jaws it threw open the window and leapt out onto the sill, and then along until it could jump to another house. Arrows flew up at it, but none met their mark.

Vimes turned back to the door. The wood buckled. Vimes readied his weapons. Finally, in a surge of splinters and blades, Vimes met his enemy.

“Bingley-Bingley-Beep. To Do Today: Arrest Vetinari.”

COMMANDER VIMES?

Vimes looked around. There was a body on the floor at his feet.

“How did I survive that?” he wondered.

YOU DIDN’T.

Vimes looked up. He looked up into hollow sockets and tiny blue pinpricks.

“Oh. I see.”

I BELIEVE THAT YOU DO.

“I guess that’s it then,” he accepted. “Tell me, are Sybil and Vetinari alright? Nobby and Colon?”

THAT ISN’T REALLY MY DEPARTMENT, MR VIMES.

“No. I suppose it isn’t, is it… But that means you haven’t seen them recently?” Vimes said hopefully.

NO, BUT THIS HAS BEEN QUITE A BUSY DAY. I WOULD LIKELY STILL REMEMBER THEM THOUGH.

“That’s good. That’s good,” Vimes sighed, as his form began to fade. “And what about that other Vimes? The one the Dis-Organiser was talking about?”

TIME AND SPACE ARE QUITE ODD, COMMANDER. WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN BUT WASN’T. AT LEAST NOT HERE.

“But is he alive?”

OH, I BELIEVE SO.

“And he ended the war?”

IN A SENSE, YES.

“And did he live happily? With Sybil?”

IT IS NOT MY PLACE TO JUDGE, BUT I THINK SO.

“That’s good,” Vimes accepted. “That’s good too.”

Finally, his form faded, and Death moved on to the next person in the building.

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

Something beautiful

One week and some change into his presidency, the changeover being a matter of arbitrary administration timing and in fact having occurred already by the time you hear this, Samuel Vimes has appointed a special committee to undertake a study of . . . well, call it artistic expression in Ankh-Morpork generally, and perhaps of the government's relationship to it in particular, but don't let that fool you into thinking he wants a memo making "appropriate recommendations."

Of course, the committee already exists, although it started life as the Moral Standards in Art Committee under Lord Vetinari's reign. In the opinion of several committee members, changing the committee's nomenclature without substantive changes to its purpose amounts to whitewashing history, and to a certain extent they are correct, although in fact as far as the _real_ committee's capacity to make substantiative recommendations it is by now a question whether it could make any worse recommendations than the ones it used to make. And that's a sad thing to say, because there are at least two of the committee members who would say that the committee used to make almost no recommendations at all, what it used to do instead being a process Vetinari once, to the committee's complete confusion, compared to "churning butter." The committee these days does make a few recommendations, now and then, and indeed they make those recommendations _well_, but this is the product of a kind of committee necrophilia in which the committee does not so much ask itself as it in fact is tasked with asking itself: well, do we really want to ask ourselves that question again?

Some of those recommendations are almost never acted on. In the case of Vetinari's comparison, a few are in fact churned. But the few that are acted on generally turn out to be remarkably positive developments, almost as if some divine intervention is being brought to bear on the city's cultural life, and this gives people like Lord Downey a warm feeling. Downey is in fact the chair of the committee. He was chosen by Vetinari in part because he has a background in law and in part because that background is irrelevant to any of the actual tasks that Downey has performed in his tenure at the helm of the MSA, and also because he has the requisite social connections to make people like his decisions about what is or is not a good idea. People like an honest broker; they hate a broker who offers nothing but a raw deal. So Downey is a well-loved individual.

Meanwhile, Ankh-Morpork's Department of Art has been shunted back into a wing of the Opera House, the Winged Monkeys having apparently been discarded by some later director who didn't see their appeal.

It's all so normal. I'm getting the feeling I'm reading a report, one where everything is ok and people are reporting that everything is ok.

And why shouldn't it be? It's not as though Vetinari was an evil tyrant or anything. He was a baron, and even a baron isn't really that powerful, when you get right down to it. Vetinari couldn't even stop the major landowners from trucking in food that contained rat tails. He couldn't do much of anything, really, that some halfway competent despot wouldn't be able to do, because he was a little old man who wasn't much of an anything himself, only a title.

In fact, the reason Vetinari was so popular, was that he had to cede most of the power to the merchants and the guild masters. Those were the people he had to deal with every day. And that was a pretty good thing, because it meant they stayed busy taking care of things.

So the idea that Vetinari would be a tyrannical god-king or even a reasonable king or mayor -- well, that's funny. He was just a little old man who needed his morning coffee or his glass of red wine as much as you or I do, only more so. And he would drink his coffee, and he would order his red wine, and like everyone else who lived in the city, he would watch the walls of Ankh-Morpork and see the city bustling and smoking like a teapot under pressure.

It's not as though anything was going to break the city, not as long as it stayed within its very well-defined parameters. And if it wasn't going to break the city then it wasn't going to disrupt the order of things, which is to say the order of the last few centuries.

The last few centuries! That sounds wrong, doesn't it? Like there's a place where the history goes to die. But that's exactly what Ankh-Morpork is, or has always been. Like a vast old cathedral, built in a period when people still believed in god, but now it's merely a fabled monument, so big that we don't even notice that it's still there. The people who are inside of it are no different from the people who believe in the cathedral, or perhaps even worse, because they think they're something else, like gods or as we say around here, "gods."

They live inside it, and the whole thing is really a game. A game, but a special game, the kind of game you can only play when you're really bored. Ankh-Morpork has all kinds of games. It has a lot of people who specialize in the game of cheating the tax man. It has a lot of people who specialize in the game of monkeying around with big machines. It has a lot of people who specialize in putting people in jail. And then there are the people who specialize in pranks and magic tricks.

They live inside Ankh-Morpork, where the games are, but not outside, where everything else is. One thing that's funny about a city that nobody visits is that it always pretends it has visitors, and one thing that's funny about a game that nobody plays is that it's always actively being played. The city loves and needs the games, and the games pay back with the most important thing that a city needs: a sense of purpose.

People don't play when they know they're being watched. They don't play when everything they do has been done by someone else before. And they don't need to, because it's all been done, right down to the giant redwoods in the industrial district and the swarms of wasps over their doors.

And it's a funny thing to ask whether the games are being played -- not by the people inside the city, but by the people outside it. Because a city is always a place where people live. It's a place they live in, and work in, and visit, and leave, and all the other things you do with a place. Even a city like Ankh-Morpork, which is just a collection of games, has people who live in it, and people who work in it, and in their own ways, people who visit it. Ankh-Morpork doesn't have to be visited -- the city will visit you, or maybe you'll be sent to it, and then you'll know, you'll say, "I'm in Ankh-Morpork."

So a city can have all kinds of people in it, and play all kinds of games, and they all fit right into the game that Ankh-Morpork plays.

And there's one thing about games, they always have rules. Some of them may change, but if you take all the games in Ankh-Morpork, all of the games people play, and look at them all, you'll find that there are common rules that make them what they are.

And if the city is a place where people live, and if its inhabitants are playing a game, and if the game that they're playing has its own rules, then it is, in some fundamental sense, a place of power. Not a lot of power, but some, like the ability to put an end to the games. And it's not as though you could ever do that, is it? No, the very thought would be absurd, as absurd as the thought that there would ever be more than one king or one god or one army.

And it's not as though the people who live in a place like Ankh-Morpork could ever really do anything about that, is it? No, of course not. The people who play the games live in the city, and the city tells the games what to do. The people who live in the city, they make the city real.

[uristmcdorf]

I am so, so torn on the casting choices being made for Night Watch.  And I also hate that the nonsensical casting choices feel harder to actually critique due to the inevitable “NOOOO PC STUFF BAD” brigade who really care what colour Carcer is and who I can only assume either never read a single Pratchett book in their lives or missed the point of them entirely.

Rambling thoughts and critiques below the dooblydo, because my ramblings contain spoilers for ALL THE BOOKS PROBABLY.  I dunno.  

1 - On the racial diversity of the casting.

YES.

HELL TO THE YES.

I am all for this.  If there’s one area Pratchett never grew as much as he did in others, it’s his approach to race and his insistence on colourblind = good.  I love seeing the casting choices here, and I’m excited especially by having a black Sybil, as she’s a woman of power and old money.  Since Pratchett never really tackled themes of race, and when he did address it at all he did so very poorly, I think this is about the best way to approach things. 

I’d actually like to see more of this as we see more casting news.

1a - On the casting of Vimes and Keel specifically

This... this doesn’t work.  A critical aspect of Vimes and Keel, pivotal for the plot of an entire novel, is that they look so similar that a scar and an eyepatch was all it took for Vimes to pass for Keel to everyone except those who knew the real Keel very well.  If we’re having a black Keel we should have a black Vimes, too. It makes me worry the people running the adaptation haven’t actually read the books they’re adapting.

2 - On the inclusion of a nonbinary actor for Cheery

UNF.

I am seriously hyped for this, and think it’s an excellent casting choice.  The Discworld dwarves canonically only have one socially-acceptable gender identity, and it’s a running theme that ignorant humans assume all dwarves are male because they have extremely low sexual dimorphism, all trending towards being short, stocky, squat, hairy bearded beings who appear AMAB to the human eye.  So I’d actually really love it if every dwarf character was cast and played by either genderqueer/nonbinary people who lean on the masc side or butch women.  I think it’d actually be a really cool move and a way to play with the fact that, canonically, you have no idea what the actual sex of any Discworld dwarf is.  There’s no reason to assume that a dwarf who identifies as a woman is what a human would term AFAB, even!  

I don’t actually expect to get that, of course.  But I think it’d be incredible if someone did that.

BRB gonna get rich and commission an adaptation of the Discworld series according to me whims.

3 - On the gender-swapping of characters

Now this could be fascinating, or it could be done poorly.  But I have Concerns.

For one, we’ve seen quite a lot of characters gender-swapped.  Vetinari, Wonse, Throat, Cruces.  That’s a third of the cast that’s so-far been announced.  And yet while we’re seeing characters like Wonse cast, I’ve not seen any sign of Rosie Palm or the Agony Aunts or Vetinari’s aunt, or other established women characters.  Which makes me worry that one of the reasons for the gender-swapping is to compensate for the loss of female characters that happens if you, for example, cut the entire sex worker industry from the adaptation.  I can see it happening, a way to “sanitise” a story that has a lot of women in it who are sex workers and who are complex and whole and respected in the narrative and who FIGHT FOR THEIR POWER and, we know from other books, COME TO THAT POWER EVENTUALLY.

I’m simultaneously intrigued and worried about this.  

3a - On a Female Throat

This could be either brilliant or terrible, depending on how they play it.  Dibbler is a rat of a person, a despicable and dirty grafter, a weed living in the cracks.  A female Dibbler who embodies that?  Would be something I don’t think we’ve ever before seen portrayed on TV.  It’d be thrilling and new in the way that a, say, unapologetically grotesque female Nobby would be.

But if they clean up or cutesify Dibbler as a character to make this an “acceptable” female character I will be severely disappointed.  And some of the other casting choices make me feel concerned that this might be what they do.

3b.  On a Female Vetinari

Ooooh this intrigues me.  I think Vetinari is one of those characters who is especially ripe for genderswapping, although I have a fondness for a aro-ace male Vetinari, which is something of my own personal headcanon.  But we know the Assassin’s guild was relatively quick to accept female members compared to other guilds, so this could work.  Especially given the themes in Pratchett’s work of sexism, which is not so much a theme in the Night Watch books as it is a constant background radiation - referenced, acknowledged, involved in multiple plot-points but not THE plot itself.  A bullied, ignored female assassin’s guild student who comes to power as eventual Patrician of the city has weight and potential and could be great.  But other casting decisions make me worry that this might be a missed opportunity.  Specifically..

3c.  One a Female Wonse who is Now Also a Wizard Apparently?

I don’t understand this one at all.  Specifically, casting Wonse as a character at all and then making them a completely different character.  Why use the name at all?  We have plenty of established wizard characters if you want a wizard.  We even have a specific FEMALE WIZARD character in Esk if you want that!

And in fact, that’s where the Wonse casting makes me feel worried for some of the casting decisions that have been made here.  As I said before, the Discworld books swim through a sea of subtly but continuously referenced sexism.  Pratchett grew increasingly skilled at portraying it and doing so while making his female characters whole, interesting and powerful in their own rights.  And an entire BOOK was based on addressing the sexism of enforced gender roles in the magical world.  I feel like this casting undermines those themes. It makes the entire gender parity casting feel shallow and sanitary.  An attempt to “solve” a problem that didn’t need solving - to give lipservice to equality and progressiveness without doing so in a meaningful way. Throwing out an opportunity to address themes Pratchett himself excelled at, for the sake of pretending sexism doesn’t exist in the discverse.

4.  On Sybil

Lady Sybil is not a conventionally attractive woman by Hollywood standards.  She’s older, and a towering giant of a woman, tall and fat and large of build and specifically and repeatedly described as such.  She’s also bald and wears wigs, due to her dragon-breeding and rescuing and the subsequent continuous loss of hair to flames.  And Vimes adores her.  And she’s a romantic interest.  She’s intelligent, witty, kind, overflowing with compassion, talented, pivotal to many plot points, and treated at all times with dignity and complexity in how she’s characterised.  She saves the day multiple times and,while some characters have been shown to mock her for her appearance, the narrative itself never treated her as the butt of a joke.  Do you have ANY FUCKING CLUE how RARE it is for a fat woman, an older woman, a woman of large build, to be portrayed as positively and completely as Pratchett wrote Sybil?

I am delighted by the decision to cast a black woman for Sybil.  I am dismayed by the decision to cast a relatively young, thin and pretty woman for her.  Us fat folks never get to see ourselves portrayed positively.  This is such a let-down.

[janehanmer]

Me and Lems running the quiz by @SgtAngua_CW

This year was my fifth Nineworlds and I think it was one of the best I’ve attended. For me it started on the Thursday evening with the Quiz that I co-write with my partner @pmsumner and some friends @lemlems and @euclidianboxes.  We were ably assisted on the evening by @boneist and @SgtAngua_CW.  I love running the quiz, its one of only two items going on so we get to see lots of people.

If you are interested in our quiz you can find our questions here and our answers here.

The final scores from the teams were tight.  Prizes were provided by Nineworlds Ents and ourselves.

Final scores

  It went well as far as I can tell and the feedback we got was overwhelmingly positive.

Amethysts unite

Friday started with a very early breakfast and then I costumed up into my Amethyst costume.  Before heading to the Steven Universe Singalong.  10 am is a bit early for a singalong, I know my voice wasn’t ready but a good time was had.  

    The Hamilton Phenomenon is The Room Where It Happens, which is on your maps as Mancy. pic.twitter.com/Pe1EmftCUp

— Nine Worlds 2018 (@London_Geekfest) August 10, 2018

Hamilton Panel by @boneist

I then took part in my first panel as a panellist.  The Hamilton Phenomenon with Genevieve Cogman, Russell Smith, Rebecca Bellovin and Emily January.  The panel went mostly okay, there were so many things I wanted to say but didn’t get a chance to which was partly down to me not being assertive enough and partly there was never going to be enough time for everyone to say everything they wanted.  The feedback was that I came across as knowledgeable and I think next year I will put myself forward for more panels. One thing I was not comfortable with was having a panel about Hamilton with only one BAME person. I know that a call was put out for BAME participants but the demographic at NW is overwhelmingly white it was not possible.

Next up was Fit is a Feminist Issue which was a round table discussion about being fit at every size which was a very positive message, but some of the stories that came out were very close to home for me and I found it really tough going and I have been left with the knowledge I need to do some work on being kinder to myself.

Everybody Hates Moral Philosophy was a Good Place talk and it was interesting but I think I would have preferred a  discussion. 

The Disney Sing along was tremendous and if to want to know what catharsis looks like its a stage full of people singing Let it Go.  There is video footage floating around on facebook.

Policy and Administration celebrating the back room in genre was excellent and very well attended.  Because really how can anyone teach at Hogwarts without a PGCE or equivalent? This was very tongue in cheek and lots of fun.

Friday evening was Knightmare live time which was excellent  and lots of fun.  After that there was much talking some plotting and putting the world to rights.  Also we have sorted all the Avengers into their Hogwarts houses with lots of debate.

Saturday 

Takarzuka Genevieve Cogman gave a talk with clips about the Takarzuka company in Japan and it was fascinating talk – because who knew there was a Pheonix Wright Ace Attorney as well as some lovely clips from Elizabeth and Dracula.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child an appreciation panel.  I really enjoyed this as I’ve only recently seen Cursed Child myself and I loved it.  The discussion ranged from very insightful to naive and back again especially when suggesting that the play should be made more available for fans to watch and should be recorded.

Top of the SFF Cops. 3 panelists with a background in law enforcement. They each got to pick two of their favourite fictional cops and build a case for them being effective police officers.  Long story short the best cop won Sam Vimes from Ankh Morpork’s City’s watch 

swords!

Swordpunk this was a workshop where I was let loose with a real sword that came up to my chest.  I learnt that I would actually be rubbish at this in a live situation, however, I got to feel like a complete badass for an hour and it was excellent.

Whedon Sing along. Yes Joss Whedon is increasingly problematic.  But the songs from Once More with Feeling and Doctor Horrible’s Sing Along Blog are excellent and there is something joyous about singing with a large group of people.  I did say that the singalongs did feel like geek church and that was nice.

I think that we should re-evaluate whether we should still be venerating Joss Whedon as he has become increasingly problematic to say the least and sing as songs in other sessions were policed it would be good to know that we were treating all sessions the same.

Black Sails Panel

Black sails: an intersectional look at sexuality and queer representation. This was a highlight panel for me.  I met some wonderful people last year at the informal Black Sails meet up and to see there was a panel this year was fantastic.  Moderated really well with some fantastic panelists who were really knew their stuff.  Also this panel included Luke Arnold who plays Silver in the show who was absolutely lovely and though he could have taken over the panel, he didn’t he listened and he offered some real insights without giving away too much.

Luke Arnold

Oh and this happened.

Luke Arnold and me

After that was the Disco and I may have thrown some serious shapes.

Sunday I was broken.  I only made it to two panels.  The first being Fat representation in geek culture 2 which was chaotic but fantastic. We came away with the recommendation of Dietland which I’ve since started watching and OMG YASS I didn’t know I needed that show in my life.  I suggest you watch it too.

The Future of Nineworlds was important,  Nineworlds will be reconstituting and Dan will be relinquishing control.  They are opening up to new people to take over and the post on their website explains everything. https://nineworlds.co.uk/future

Important thing that happened. I am not really in a position to comment on this but I was in the room and this is accurate.   https://blackfemgeekery.wordpress.com/2018/08/12/white-worlds/

Nineworlds tries really hard, but it is not perfect.  The organisation wants to do better and they have said they will take this on board and work on it for next year.

I had a very good nine worlds.  I met some wonderful people as I do every year.  I stepped outside of my comfort zone as I took on leading the organising of the quiz, I appeared on my first panel and I played with real swords.  I charged the stage to sing let it go and I got very enthusiastic on the dance floor particularly when Public Service Broadcasting was being played.

My takeaway from nineworlds is to get anything out of nine worlds you have to engage you have to participate and be willing to take some risks.  It is my favourite convention and I hope that it comes back next year and I will be there when it does.

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Nineworlds 2018 This year was my fifth Nineworlds and I think it was one of the best I’ve attended.