The Wit And Wisdom Of Discworld

by The Wit

  *

  ‘When you’ve been a wizard as long as I have, my boy [said the Senior Wrangler], you’ll learn that as soon as you find anything that offers amazing possibilities for the improvement of the human condition it’s best to put the lid back on and pretend it never happened.’

  *

  Droit de mortis: broadly speaking, the acceleration of a wizard through the ranks of wizardry by killing off more senior wizards. It is a practice currently in abeyance, since a few enthusiastic attempts to remove Mustrum Ridcully resulted in one wizard being unable to hear properly for two weeks. Ridcully felt that there was indeed room at the top, and he was occupying all of it.

  *

  It is a simple universal law. People always expect to use a holiday in the sun as an opportunity to read those books they’ve always meant to read, but an alchemical combination of sun, quartz crystals and coconut oil will somehow metamorphose any improving book into a rather thicker one with a name containing at least one Greek word or letter (The Gamma Imperative, The Delta Season, The Alpha Project and, in the more extreme cases, even The Mu Kau Pi Caper). Sometimes a hammer and sickle turn up on the cover. This is probably caused by sunspot activity, since they are invariably the wrong way round.

  *

  Any seasoned traveller soon learns to avoid anything wished on them as a ‘regional speciality’, because all the term means is that the dish is so unpleasant the people living everywhere else will bite off their own legs rather than eat it. But hosts still press it upon distant guests anyway: ‘Go on, have the dog’s head stuffed with macerated cabbage and pork noses - it’s a regional speciality.’

  *

  The University’s housekeeper [it had been unkindly said] had a face full of chins; there was a glossiness about her that put some people in mind of a candle that had been kept in the warm for too long. There wasn’t anything approaching a straight line anywhere on Mrs Whitlow, until she found that something hadn’t been dusted properly, when you could use her lips as a ruler.

  *

  The wizards were civilized men of considerable education and culture. When faced with being inadvertently marooned on a desert island they understood immediately that the first thing to do was place the blame.

  *

  ‘Remember what we’d say in those days?’ said the Senior Wrangler. ‘ “Never trust a wizard over sixty-five”? Whatever happened?’

  ‘We got past the age of sixty-five, Senior Wrangler.’

  *

  The Bursar was, as he would probably be the first to admit, not the most mentally stable of people. He would probably be the first to admit that he was a tea-strainer.

  *

  Once a moderately jolly wizard camped by a dried-up waterhole under the shade of a tree that he was completely unable to identify. And he swore as he hacked and hacked at a can of beer, saying, ‘What kind of idiots put beer in tins?’

  *

  Beer! It was only water, really, with stuff in it. Wasn’t it? And most of what was in it was yeast, which was practically a medicine and definitely a food. In fact, when you thought about it, beer was only a kind of runny bread.

  *

  ‘Is it true that your life passes before your eyes before you die?’

  YES.

  ‘Ghastly thought, really’ Rince-wind shuddered. ‘Oh, gods, I’ve just had another one. Suppose I am just about to die and this is my whole life passing in front of my eyes?’

  I THINK PERHAPS YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND. PEOPLE’S WHOLE LIVES DO PASS IN FRONT OF THEIR EYES BEFORE THEY DIE. THE PROCESS IS CALLED ‘LIVING’.

  MIGHTILY Oats has not picked a good time to be a priest.

  He thought he’d come to Lancre for a simple ceremony. Now lie’s caught tip in a war between vampires and witches.

  There’s Voting Agnes, who is really in two minds about everything. Magrat, who is trying to combine witchcraft and nappies, Nanny Ogg … and Granny Weatherwax, who is big trouble.

  And the vampires are intelligent. They’ve got style and fancy waistcoats. They’re out of the casket, and want a bite of the future. Mightily Oats knows he has a prayer, but he wishes he had an axe.

  In Lancre the only truly flat places were tables and the top of some people’s heads.

  *

  Those who are inclined to casual cruelty say that inside a fat girl is a thin girl and a lot of chocolate.

  *

  Agnes thought that a dumpy girl should not wear a tall hat, especially with black. It made her look as though someone had dropped a liquorice-flavoured ice-cream cone.

  *

  The Lancrastian idea of posh sanitation was a non-slippery path to the privy and a mail-order catalogue with really soft pages.

  *

  Sometimes witches have to be the ones that make the difficult decisions for people. Life and death. Choosing between saving a mother or her new-born son.

  ‘You got to come to Mrs Ivy and her baby missus!’

  ‘I thought old Mrs Patternoster was seeing to her,’ said Granny, ramming her hatpins into place with the urgency of a warrior preparing for sudden battle.

  ‘She says it’s all gone wrong miss!’

  …

  Slice was perched along the sides of a cleft in the mountains that couldn’t be dignified by the name of valley. In the moonlight Granny saw the pale upturned face waiting in the shadows of the garden as she came in to land.

  ‘Evening, Mr Ivy’ she said, leaping off. ‘Upstairs, is she?’

  ‘In the barn,’ said Ivy flatly. ‘The cow kicked her … hard.’

  Granny’s expression stayed impassive.

  ‘We shall see,’ she said, ‘what may be done.’

  In the barn, one look at Mrs Patternoster’s face told her how little that might now be.

  ‘It’s bad,’ she whispered, as Granny looked at the moaning figure on the straw. ‘I reckon we’ll lose both of them … or maybe just one …’

  There was, if you were listening for it, just the suggestion of a question in that sentence. Granny focused her mind.

  ‘It’s a boy’ she said.

  Mrs Patternoster didn’t bother to wonder how Granny knew, but her expression indicated that a little more weight had been added to a burden.

  ‘I’d better go and put it to John Ivy, then,’ she said.

  She’d barely moved before Granny Weatherwax’s hand locked on her arm.

  ‘He’s no part in this,’ she said.

  ‘But after all, he is the—’

  ‘He’s no part in this.’

  Mrs Patternoster looked into the blue stare and knew two things. One was that Mr Ivy had no part in this, and the other was that anything that happened in this barn was never, ever, going to be mentioned again.

  ‘I think I can bring ‘em to mind,’ said Granny, letting go and rolling up her sleeves. ‘Pleasant couple, as I recall. He’s a good husband, by all accounts.’ She poured warm water from its jug into the bowl that the midwife had set up on a manger.

  Mrs Patternoster nodded.

  ‘Of course, it’s difficult for a man working these steep lands alone,’ Granny went on, washing her hands. Mrs Patternoster nodded again, mournfully.

  ‘Well, I reckon you should take him into the cottage, Mrs Patternoster, and make him a cup of tea,’ Granny commanded. ‘You can tell him I’m doing all I can.’

  This time the midwife nodded gratefully.

  When she had fled, Granny laid a hand on Mrs Ivy’s damp forehead.

  ‘Well now, Florence Ivy,’ she said, ‘let us see what might be done. But first of all … no pain …’

  INDEED.

  Granny didn’t bother to turn round.

  ‘I thought you’d be here,’ she said, as she knelt down in the straw.

  WHERE ELSE? said Death.

  ‘Do you know who you’re here for?’

  THAT IS NOT MY CHOICE. ON THE VERY EDGE YOU WILL ALWAYS FIND SOME UNCERTAINTY.

  Granny felt the words in her head for several seconds, like litt
le melting cubes of ice. On the very, very edge, then, there had to be … judgement.

  ‘There’s too much damage here,’ she said, at last. ‘Too much.’

  A few minutes later she felt the life stream past her. Death had the decency to leave without a word.

  When Mrs Patternoster tremulously knocked on the door and pushed it open, Granny was in the cow’s stall. The midwife saw her stand up, holding a piece of thorn.

  ‘Been in the beast’s leg all day’ she said. ‘No wonder it was fretful. Try and make sure he doesn’t kill the cow, you understand? They’ll need it.’

  Mrs Patternoster glanced down at the rolled-up blanket in the straw. Granny had tactfully placed it out of sight of Mrs Ivy, who was sleeping now.

  ‘I’ll tell him,’ said Granny, brushing off her dress. ‘As for her, well, she’s strong and young and you know what to do. You keep an eye on her, and me or Nanny Ogg will drop in when we can.’

  It was doubtful that anyone in Slice would defy Granny Weatherwax, but Granny saw the faintest grey shadow of disapproval in the midwife’s expression.

  ‘You still reckon I should’ve asked Mr Ivy?’ she said.

  ‘That’s what I would have done …’ the woman mumbled.

  ‘You don’t like him? You think he’s a bad man?’ said Granny, adjusting her hatpins.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Then what’s he ever done to me, that I should hurt him so?’

  *

  The people of Lancre wouldn’t dream of living in anything other than a monarchy. They’d done so for thousands of years and knew that it worked. But they’d also found that it didn’t do to pay too much attention to what the King wanted, because there was bound to be another king along in forty years or so and he’d be certain to want something different and so they’d have gone to all that trouble for nothing. In the meantime, his job as they saw it was to mostly stay in the palace, practise the waving, have enough sense to face the right way on coins and let them get on with the ploughing, sowing, growing and harvesting. It was, as they saw it, a social contract. They did what they always did, and he let them.

  *

  ‘I used to know an Igor from Uberwald,’ said Nanny. ‘Walked with a limp. One eye a bit higher than the other. Had the same manner of … speaking. Very good at brain juggling, too.’

  ‘That thoundth like my Uncle Igor,’ said Igor. ‘He worked for the mad doctor at Blinz. Ha, an’ he wath a proper mad doctor, too, not like the mad doctorth you get thethe dayth. And the thervantth? Even worthe. No pride thethe dayth.’ He tapped the brandy flask for emphasis. ‘When Uncle Igor wath thent out for a ge-niuth’th brain, that’th what you damn well got. There wath none of thith fumble-finger thtuff and then pinching a brain out of the “Really Inthane” jar and hopin’ no one’d notithe. They alwayth do, anyway’

  Nanny took a step back. The only sensible way to hold a conversation with an Igor was when you had an umbrella.

  *

  Not many people ever tasted Nanny Ogg’s home-made brandy; it was technically impossible. Once it encountered the warmth of the human mouth it immediately turned into fumes. You drank it via your sinuses.

  *

  ‘The trouble is that people always think of vampires in terms of their diet,’ said the Count, as Nanny hurried away. ‘It’s really rather insulting. You eat animal flesh and vegetables, but it hardly defines you, does it?’

  *

  ‘How does Perdita work, then?’ said Nanny.

  Agnes sighed. ‘Look, you know the part of you that wants to do all the things you don’t dare do, and thinks the thoughts you don’t dare think?’

  Nanny’s face stayed blank. Agnes floundered. ‘Like … maybe … rip off all your clothes and run naked in the rain?’ she hazarded.

  ‘Oh, yes. Right,’ said Nanny.

  ‘Well … I suppose Perdita is that part of me.’

  ‘Really? I’ve always been that part of me,’ said Nanny. ‘The important thing is to remember where you left your clothes.’

  *

  ‘People have quite the wrong idea about vampires, you see. Are we fiendish killers?’ He beamed at them. ‘Well, yes, of course we are. But only when necessary’

  *

  They were listening quite contentedly to the worst music since Shawn Ogg’s bagpipes had been dropped down the stairs.

  *

  They watched the servant limp off. The Count shook his head.

  ‘He’ll never retire,’ said Vlad. ‘He’ll never take a hint.’

  ‘And it’s so old fashioned having a servant called Igor,’ said the Countess. ‘He really is too much.’

  ‘Look, it’s simple,’ said Lacrimosa. ‘Just take him down to the cellars, slam him in the Iron Maiden, stretch him on the rack over a fire for a day or two, and then slice him thinly from the feet upwards, so he can watch. You’ll be doing him a kindness, really’

  ‘I suppose it’s the best way’ said the Count sadly.

  *

  There was more to Mr Oats than met the eye. There had to be.

  *

  Books that were all about the world tended to be written by people who knew all about books rather than all about the world.

  *

  ‘Look, you said you’ve studied vampires, didn’t you? What’s good for vampires?’

  Oats thought for a moment. ‘Er … a nice dry coffin, er, plenty of fresh blood, er, overcast skies …’ His voice trailed off when he saw her expression. ‘Ah … well, it depends exactly where they’re from, I remember. Uberwald is a very big place. Er, cutting off the head and staking them in the heart is generally efficacious.’

  ‘But that works on everyone,’ said Nanny.

  *

  ‘You don’t know what he’s like,’ said Agnes. ‘He looks at me as if he’s undressing me with his eyes.’

  ‘Eyes is allowed,’ said Nanny.

  *

  Agnes’s arm whirled. The holy water spiralled out of the bottle and hit Vlad full in the chest.

  He threw his arms wide and screamed as water cascaded down and poured into his shoes.

  ‘Look at this waistcoat! Will you look at this waistcoat? Do you know what water does to silk? You just never get it out! No matter what you do, there’s always a mark.’

  *

  Few birds could sit more meekly than the Lancre wowhawk, or lappet-faced worrier, a carnivore permanently on the lookout for the vegetarian option.

  The Count blew a smoke ring.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said, as it drifted away. ‘You must be the mob.’

  ‘May I introduce you to Sergeant Kraput, and this gentleman here picking his teeth with his knife is Corporal Svitz. They and their men will be going on duty in, oh, about an hour. Purely for reasons of security, you understand.’

  ‘An’ then we’ll gut yer like a clam and stuff yer with straw,’ said Corporal Svitz.

  ‘Ah. This is technical military language of which I know little,’ said the Count. ‘I do so hope there is no unpleasantness.’

  ‘I don’t,’ said Sergeant Kraput.

  ‘What scamps they are,’ said the Count.

  *

  ‘It’th a pleathure to be commanded in a clear, firm authoritative voithe, mithtreth,’ said Igor, lurching over to the bridles. ‘None of thith “Would you mind …” rubbith. An Igor liketh to know where he thtandth.’

  ‘Slightly lopsidedly?’ said Magrat.

  *

  ‘The Prophet Brutha said that Om helps those who help one another.’

  ‘And does he?’

  ‘To be honest, there are a number of opinions of what was meant.’

  ‘How many?’

  ‘About one hundred and sixty, since the Schism of 10.30 a.m., February 23. That was when the Re-United Free Chelonianists (Hubwards Convocation) schismed from the Re-United Free Chelonianists (Rimwards Convocation). It was rather serious.’

  ‘Blood spilled?’ said Agnes. She wasn’t really interested, but it took her mind off whatever might
be waking up in a minute.

  ‘No, but there were fisticuffs and a deacon had ink spilled on him.’

  *

  ‘The Omnians used to burn witches …’

  ‘They never did,’ said Granny.

  ‘I’m afraid I have to admit that the records show—’

  ‘They never burned witches,’ said Granny. ‘Probably they burned some old ladies who spoke up or couldn’t run away. I wouldn’t look for witches bein’ burned,’ she added, shifting position. ‘I might look for witches doin’ the burning, though. We ain’t all nice.’

  *

  ‘There is a very interesting debate raging at the moment [among Omnians] about the nature of sin, for example.’

  ‘And what do they think? Against it, are they?’ [said Granny]

  ‘It’s not as simple as that. It’s not a black and white issue. There are so many shades of grey’

  ‘There’s no greys, only white that’s got grubby. I’m surprised you don’t know that. And sin, young man, is when you treat people as things. Including yourself. That’s what sin is.’

  ‘It’s a lot more complicated than that—’

  ‘No. It ain’t. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they’re getting worried that they won’t like the truth. People as things, that’s where it starts.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure there are worse crimes—’

  ‘But they starts with thinking about people as things …’

  *

  Scraps tried to lick Igor. He was a dog with a lot of lick to share.

  ‘Thcrapth, play dead,’ said Igor. The dog dropped and rolled over with his legs in the air.

  ‘Thee?’ said Igor. ‘He rememberth!’

  *

  Agnes indicated the headless vampire. ‘Er … is that one Vlad?’ she said.

  ‘We can check. Piotr, show her the head.’

  A young man obediently went to the fireplace, pulled on a glove, lifted the lid of a big saucepan and held up a head by its hair.

  ‘That’s not Vlad,’ said Agnes, swallowing. No, said Perdita, Vlad was taller.

  *

  The Countess clutched his arm.

  ‘Oh, this does so remind me of our honeymoon,’ she said. ‘Don’t you remember those wonderful nights in Grjsknvij?’