REVIEW: Wyrd Sisters
In re-reading the Discworld books, I find myself re-evaluating my own prejudices towards the series. I've often undervalued the Witches series, partly because I was more interested in the antics of Rincewind and the City Watch and Death and his family. The characters were interesting enough, but the stories didn't quite grab me. Nonetheless, Wyrd Sisters, at least, is due for some change in opinion...
The Felmets have usurped and murdered the rightful king of Lancre, and the heir has fallen into the hands of a newly established coven of witches in Lancre: the stern, no-nonsense Granny Weatherwax, the bawdy Nanny Ogg, and the rather wet Magrat Garlick. After sending the heir to safety with a troupe of actors, the witches must deal with the machinations of the paranoid Lord Felmet, and his vicious wife. Between plays, a Fool who is far from a fool, ghosts of kings past, and an angry land, the three witches have their work cut out for them, for a war of words and ideas is about to spring up between them and the Felmets, and even if the populace of Lancre don't turn against the witches, they might just turn against each other...
I think that this book probably marks the real turning point where the Discworld series does start to become more serious. While Mort and Equal Rites had serious themes, it was still done more facetiously, and while there is a strong amount of facetiousness in Wyrd Sisters, it is also a much more serious book throughout.
Like many a Witches book, it takes off strongly after a literary genre or part of mythology, examining what makes a story. In Witches Abroad, fairytales were examined. Lords and Ladies, when it wasn't ripping off A Midsummer Night's Dream, was examining the mythology behind fairies and elves. Carpe Jugulum deconstructed vampire stories, while in some respects, the Tiffany Aching stories deconstructed both the Witches series itself, as well as the Harry Potter books (and yes, I may be reading too much into that, but deal with it).
The characters of the witches are probably the strongest point in the novel. Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg leap off the page, fully formed, although I feel that Magrat, an otherwise marvellous character, could have done with a lot more development. The Felmets are wonderful versions of the Macbeth characters, even if a little lacking, and the Fool, in his debut, is an intriguing character who you often feel sorry for. However, the characters of Tomjon and Hwel are less interesting than they should be, which is a real pity, and I get the feeling that Terry Pratchett inserted Greebo mostly as a one-off joke that later developed into the monster moggy we know and, uh, 'love' today.
The plot, at the surface, seems like a twisted version of Macbeth, but once you get past that layer (and commenting on Shakespeare in general), you start to find what this really is about, a common thread throughout the Witches books, about stories, words, and ideas. This has a good start here, unlike the extended philosophy on the nature of magic (and gender politics) that is Equal Rites. It's cringe-inducing but still funny to watch Granny Weatherwax disrupting a play, and thinking that it has a power that she herself can't do anything against, or at least that's what she thinks. And the Felmets are redeemed from being melodramatic villains by the fact that they use psychological warfare and propaganda against the witches, though having more of an example of the people losing their respect of the witches would have made good reading (as it did in I Shall Wear Midnight).
Unfortunately, the climax, while one can understand what needs to be done, is a little confusing, and I feel that more could have been made of the anger of the land of Lancre against Felmet's rule. The sequences with Hwel and Tomjon are not as good as they can be. While Hwel is an interesting expy of Shakespeare and writers in general, Tomjon seems too much of some kind of Marty Stu or some sort of similar character. And the sequence where the witches break up is, well, not as well written as it could have been, and should have stuck a little better.
Still, Wyrd Sisters surprised me on re-reading, and hopefully, my re-evaluation of the Witches series will turn up more surprising opinions. After all, an idea isn't half baked as long as it is coven-baked...
Special New Utterance Rating Trial: Ooh.
First words: The wind howled.
Last words: They went, though, just the same.
