SPOILERS Guards! Guards! Discussion Group *Spoilers*
- Thread starter Tonyblack
- Start date
Here, figure other... Terry Pratchett people might be interested. Started doing an analysis of Guards! Guards!, specifically: presentation of Vimes. You know, language techniques, some notes on narrative, so on. On part 1, if you are interested I might post them here. Guards!, probably... not my favourite book, but in my eyes one of the first where Discworld became Discworld. Oh, and Vimes started existing, always good.
Seems a bit tactless to have my first post link to a site of my own, but ah well.
Seems a bit tactless to have my first post link to a site of my own, but ah well.
I've read this book countless times and have only just realised that Terry never refers to the dragon as "he". Errol is mentioned as a male, but the "king" is the only male pronoun given to the dragon. And despite all that, it's still an amazing reveal when we find out the truth at the end of the book. My admiration for Terry's writing increases the more I read his books. 
In GG, we have three similar characters, all small of body:
Errol, ugly-cute, smelly
Nobby, ugly, unwashed, and, with foreknowledge that he does have girlfriends, possibly ugly-cute
Brother Dunnykin, whom we don't actually see but who is smelly and has severe halitosis. He also is of very humble origins and insists that he might have the blood of kings, which is true, he might.
Halitosis is often referred to as "dragonbreath". Dunnykin is the closest humanoid analog of Errol.
Dunnykin is attacked by a crocodile, a dragonish creature, and may or may not have been well enough to return to the Brethren in time to be flamed. He is referred to as 'poor old Dunnykin' which may hint that he is crippled. He is not referred to by name in the last meeting.
Errol seems to be attacked but is uninjured and eventually courts and wins the dragon ex-Queen of A-M.
Nobby is looked upon kindly by Lady Sybil, who nevertheless (whew) SPOILERS ends up with the skinny, not well-washed, and tall-but-shorter-than-she-is Captain Vimes. Vimes is not described as handsome but Pete Postlethwaite could be described as homely-cute and he's the original image Sir pTerry had. Nobby, with the rest of the Watch, are attacked by the dragon but not injured. Nobby also has humble origins (despite the hints of a possible noble connection via the ring, the necklaces and the tiara). Nevertheless, Nobby doesn't marry any of his girlfriends on page (so far); he does SPOILERS most recently find himself courting a non-homo-sapiens-human female.
Does this add up to anything? Different shadings of similar characters let an author play with the possibilities. It also makes me wince at the passing thought that perhaps at one point Sir pTerry considered having Nobby marry into the nobility. Or back into the nobility, if we can believe Dragon's charts. Would Dragon falsify his own work? If he would, could any of it then be trusted? I think false genealogies are a worse crime than nonexistent ones.
Errol, ugly-cute, smelly
Nobby, ugly, unwashed, and, with foreknowledge that he does have girlfriends, possibly ugly-cute
Brother Dunnykin, whom we don't actually see but who is smelly and has severe halitosis. He also is of very humble origins and insists that he might have the blood of kings, which is true, he might.
Halitosis is often referred to as "dragonbreath". Dunnykin is the closest humanoid analog of Errol.
Dunnykin is attacked by a crocodile, a dragonish creature, and may or may not have been well enough to return to the Brethren in time to be flamed. He is referred to as 'poor old Dunnykin' which may hint that he is crippled. He is not referred to by name in the last meeting.
Errol seems to be attacked but is uninjured and eventually courts and wins the dragon ex-Queen of A-M.
Nobby is looked upon kindly by Lady Sybil, who nevertheless (whew) SPOILERS ends up with the skinny, not well-washed, and tall-but-shorter-than-she-is Captain Vimes. Vimes is not described as handsome but Pete Postlethwaite could be described as homely-cute and he's the original image Sir pTerry had. Nobby, with the rest of the Watch, are attacked by the dragon but not injured. Nobby also has humble origins (despite the hints of a possible noble connection via the ring, the necklaces and the tiara). Nevertheless, Nobby doesn't marry any of his girlfriends on page (so far); he does SPOILERS most recently find himself courting a non-homo-sapiens-human female.
Does this add up to anything? Different shadings of similar characters let an author play with the possibilities. It also makes me wince at the passing thought that perhaps at one point Sir pTerry considered having Nobby marry into the nobility. Or back into the nobility, if we can believe Dragon's charts. Would Dragon falsify his own work? If he would, could any of it then be trusted? I think false genealogies are a worse crime than nonexistent ones.
I'm not sure that we have discussed the similarity between Carrot and Steve Martin's character in the 1979 film "The Jerk".
It's not a huge similarity - but Martin is brought up by a black family and doesn't realise he's any different until his adopted parents inform him. He takes things too literally - like Carrot, causing all sorts of hilarity to ensue.
That's about it really. There is ten years from the release of the film and the publishing of Guards! Guards! (1989) and I wonder if the character influenced Terry when he was writing the story.
It's not a huge similarity - but Martin is brought up by a black family and doesn't realise he's any different until his adopted parents inform him. He takes things too literally - like Carrot, causing all sorts of hilarity to ensue.
That's about it really. There is ten years from the release of the film and the publishing of Guards! Guards! (1989) and I wonder if the character influenced Terry when he was writing the story.
Pardon the necromancy, but ...
It's been a while since I read GG, but if I remember, they are injured -- and pretty badly too. When they are on the roof of a building (I can't remember which?) and Sgt Colon leans on a "gargoyle" that turns out to be the Dragon, who flies off and then returns to flame the building, they all fall off. They survive (somehow -- Carrot grabs them and jumps off the roof, and they land on the roof of an outside toilet, IIRC?), but I can't imagine them escaping without injuries. Indeed, in the Big Comic version, they are later seen with bandages -- IIRC, Carrot has a band-aid on his face.
The only reason Nobby has them is because he nicked them off Sconner on S's deathbed (as we learn in FOC). Who's to say that Sconner didn't nick them himself? He has a *ahem* less-than-savoury past, as Lord Rust would put it.
I don't think Dragon would falsify his own charts. Note how heartbroken (or vengeful) he seems to be when the charts are lost. But only he would know for sure.
I haven't seen that film, but if that's all it is, then it sounds (IIRC) much more like the movie "Elf" (with Will Ferrell). Granted, I haven't seen either film from start to finish; movies like that make me wince.
It's been a while since I read GG, but if I remember, they are injured -- and pretty badly too. When they are on the roof of a building (I can't remember which?) and Sgt Colon leans on a "gargoyle" that turns out to be the Dragon, who flies off and then returns to flame the building, they all fall off. They survive (somehow -- Carrot grabs them and jumps off the roof, and they land on the roof of an outside toilet, IIRC?), but I can't imagine them escaping without injuries. Indeed, in the Big Comic version, they are later seen with bandages -- IIRC, Carrot has a band-aid on his face.
The only reason Nobby has them is because he nicked them off Sconner on S's deathbed (as we learn in FOC). Who's to say that Sconner didn't nick them himself? He has a *ahem* less-than-savoury past, as Lord Rust would put it.
I don't think Dragon would falsify his own charts. Note how heartbroken (or vengeful) he seems to be when the charts are lost. But only he would know for sure.
I haven't seen that film, but if that's all it is, then it sounds (IIRC) much more like the movie "Elf" (with Will Ferrell). Granted, I haven't seen either film from start to finish; movies like that make me wince.
I think the "orphan being raised by opposites" thing is a pretty old literary convention. Look at the Jungle Book, the Prince and the Pauper and Mark Twain's Pudd'nhead Wilson. The "misplaced" orphan in all those books thinks they're the race, class or species of their adoptive parents and tend to be rather clueless. In Pudd'n head it's actually pretty offensive--two babies that look mixed race are given to the wrong family--the baby born "white" is mistakenly given to a poor black family, and the one born "black" is given to a rich white family. The "black" child grows up to be very smart (presumably because he's brought up by whites) but he's also vain and evil, while the "white" child grows up to be kind but ignorant and stupid (because he's brought up by blacks). It was supposed to be a nature vs. nurture argument, but it's really still bigotry hiding under enlightenment.
You have misremembered it. Both boys are believably white. The slave mother of one of them is blonde and blue-eyed and white-skinned; the only way the outsider, Wilson, could tell her origin was cultural - she talked and behaved as she had been brought up. [Very much the same point that G.B.Shaw made in Pygmalion] Part of Twain's point was that it no longer mattered what color they were. They were judged entirely by their parents/ancestors. The one raised "black" was deliberately kept as ignorant as were all the people he was placed with; his ignorance wasn't made out to be innate.
Aha! Raisindot is right -- the same literary device is also used (and played with) in Oscar Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest". As in:
Come to think of it, the same device is also used in several Gilbert and Sullivan plays (some would say ad nauseum). In "HMS Pinafore", Captain Corcoran is really a humble sailor, and the Ralph Rackstraw (the humble sailor) is really the captain. In "The Pirates of Penzance", all the pirates turn out to be Lords. In "The Mikado", Nanki-Poo masquerades as a second trombone, but is really the son of His Majesty the Mikado. And so on. It's used so often in those things that it comes as a relief when everyone in the play turns out to be exactly who they are.
Then again, the same device is also used very often in Agatha Christie's stories. But there, the murderer has a very good reason for disguising him/herself. No-one wants to be hanged.
As in:Ernest Moncrieff (the son of Lady Bracknell's poor sister, and brother to Algernon) is accidentally put in Miss Prism's handbag and left at Victoria Railway Station. He is then found by a charitable gentleman and raised as Jack Worthing.
Come to think of it, the same device is also used in several Gilbert and Sullivan plays (some would say ad nauseum). In "HMS Pinafore", Captain Corcoran is really a humble sailor, and the Ralph Rackstraw (the humble sailor) is really the captain. In "The Pirates of Penzance", all the pirates turn out to be Lords.
In "The Mikado", Nanki-Poo masquerades as a second trombone, but is really the son of His Majesty the Mikado. And so on. It's used so often in those things that it comes as a relief when everyone in the play turns out to be exactly who they are. Then again, the same device is also used very often in Agatha Christie's stories. But there, the murderer has a very good reason for disguising him/herself. No-one wants to be hanged.
Yeah, it's been awhile since I read it, but, unless I've totally forgotten everything about it, I think my original statement is correct. The "white" one raised in a black household acted and talked in a way that reflected the stereotypes of black people having lower intelligence. Again, Twain is making the "nurture" argument--it's not genetics that matter, it's upbringing. But it's still offensive because he enforced the notion that a child of any race brought up in black household would end up being less intelligent than a similar child brought up in a white household.
That is very true, now that I think of it. There is also Tarzan, of course. It was just a case of watching The Jerk and making the connection. Running the idea through me Pratchett Filter, so to speak. 
