Question about Snuff
- Thread starter Malky79
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A
Of course scatological humour has been used throughout the ages, but, to pick a crass example, would you give it a thumbs up if in the next book there'd be a lot of underage sex depicted as something positive and 'normal'?
After all, Romeo&Juliet were what 13? 14? and the old greeks and romans had sex with adulescent boys.
I am a bit exaggerating here, yes, but thing is you have to see and judge everything in the context of the time it was written and in the context of the text itself. When a joke, if not concept comes out of nowhere there is the sore feeling of it is just there, at mildest, for having a certain joke-per-page count.
YMMV of course.
After all, Romeo&Juliet were what 13? 14? and the old greeks and romans had sex with adulescent boys.
I am a bit exaggerating here, yes, but thing is you have to see and judge everything in the context of the time it was written and in the context of the text itself. When a joke, if not concept comes out of nowhere there is the sore feeling of it is just there, at mildest, for having a certain joke-per-page count.
YMMV of course.
You think this kind of stuff is new?
Nanny Smiling broadly at a bathtub being filled in the next room, or her "sightseeing" on long coach rides (hell, nanny overall really)
Privy jokes exist through the series
the Garderobe in L&L
Fool Varence using Privy as punctuation
Constant references to widdling in Maurice
The Long Man
Big Fido's gaseous problem
Moist landing in something soft
Doctrine of signatures and Nobby's love of a certain shaped mushroom
Cohen's love of soft lavatory paper
Living compost in reaperman
References to the odd placement of the trapdoor on trojan horses
and ofcourse without TP (heh) and Errol, we wouldn't have these lovely examples of moving picture entertainment
and thats just off the top of my head. if you think that Terry is somehow above low brow humor, well, thats just a phallusy.
Nanny Smiling broadly at a bathtub being filled in the next room, or her "sightseeing" on long coach rides (hell, nanny overall really)
Privy jokes exist through the series
the Garderobe in L&L
Fool Varence using Privy as punctuation
Constant references to widdling in Maurice
The Long Man
Big Fido's gaseous problem
Moist landing in something soft
Doctrine of signatures and Nobby's love of a certain shaped mushroom
Cohen's love of soft lavatory paper
Living compost in reaperman
References to the odd placement of the trapdoor on trojan horses
and ofcourse without TP (heh) and Errol, we wouldn't have these lovely examples of moving picture entertainment
and thats just off the top of my head. if you think that Terry is somehow above low brow humor, well, thats just a phallusy.
A
But with all the things you listed, they had the readers thinking about what was implied.
Agree with it or not, but I think it would have lost a lot if things would have gotten an explicit explanation. Take L&L for example.
Would the text have really been better/just as good if instead of what it says about the closet it would have been said outright what's there?
It had been said in another thread, but one of the things that somehow made Discworld Discworld was that Sir Terry left to the readers imagination what didn't need an explanation.
Agree with it or not, but I think it would have lost a lot if things would have gotten an explicit explanation. Take L&L for example.
Would the text have really been better/just as good if instead of what it says about the closet it would have been said outright what's there?
It had been said in another thread, but one of the things that somehow made Discworld Discworld was that Sir Terry left to the readers imagination what didn't need an explanation.
Well, in I Shall Wear Midnight, there is underage sex - and it was included because it is normal. Happens all the time. It's a part of life. Bodily functions are a part of life too.
We can't ignore the gross biological weaknesses of the human body. No matter how elevated our thoughts, our bodies are disgusting. They smell and they squirt waste products all over the place and they're teeming with bacteria and parasites. This is the true equality of man - everyone poops, and by extension everyone dies, because these frail meatsacks will wear out long before we're finished using them. This is something Terry Pratchett in particular must now understand with exacting clarity.
That is why I argue that toilet humour is important and legitimate in literature - because in the face of this weakness, what is there to do but laugh? That's why I disagree with your statement that jokes like these are nothing but "cheap laughs". What's cheaper about them than any joke? Why shouldn't we laugh at our own illusions of dignity? Nobody looks dignified when they poop, or throw up, or give birth. It ties in with the goblins, it ties in with the story being set in the countryside, where people live with the more disgusting parts of life everyday. Toilet humour, I believe, has as valid a place in Snuff as any other kind of humour.
We can't ignore the gross biological weaknesses of the human body. No matter how elevated our thoughts, our bodies are disgusting. They smell and they squirt waste products all over the place and they're teeming with bacteria and parasites. This is the true equality of man - everyone poops, and by extension everyone dies, because these frail meatsacks will wear out long before we're finished using them. This is something Terry Pratchett in particular must now understand with exacting clarity.
That is why I argue that toilet humour is important and legitimate in literature - because in the face of this weakness, what is there to do but laugh? That's why I disagree with your statement that jokes like these are nothing but "cheap laughs". What's cheaper about them than any joke? Why shouldn't we laugh at our own illusions of dignity? Nobody looks dignified when they poop, or throw up, or give birth. It ties in with the goblins, it ties in with the story being set in the countryside, where people live with the more disgusting parts of life everyday. Toilet humour, I believe, has as valid a place in Snuff as any other kind of humour.
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The point I tried to make (told you I suck at wording) was that the mentioned comedies were written when people had a complete different mentality.
Live and let live if you like things as they are, but to me it still feels as if several things are just there for the sake of it.
As said, the underage sex was exaggarating things, and I apologise if I should have offended anyone.
Thing is:
If I see the newer books and their changed tone and style in comparsion to the others something feels deeply wrong.
And Z: I'm trying. I'm really trying.
Live and let live if you like things as they are, but to me it still feels as if several things are just there for the sake of it.
As said, the underage sex was exaggarating things, and I apologise if I should have offended anyone.
Thing is:
If I see the newer books and their changed tone and style in comparsion to the others something feels deeply wrong.
And Z: I'm trying. I'm really trying.
Toilet humour has always been a part of British and probably European culture.
For example, the French professional farter, Le Pétomane.
And in case you think that children aren't interested in such things - I'd draw your attention to the very popular book in Tucson: Who Pooped in the Sonoran Desert, which is aimed at children and is quite fascinating.
Terry's books are full of mentions of bodily secretions, Snuff is by no means the first. It's funny when Fred Colon is saved from the dragon in Guards! Guards! only to land in a pile of something soft and smelly. And when the would-be assassin falls foul of Sam Vimes's booby trap and ends up in the cesspit.
For example, the French professional farter, Le Pétomane.
And in case you think that children aren't interested in such things - I'd draw your attention to the very popular book in Tucson: Who Pooped in the Sonoran Desert, which is aimed at children and is quite fascinating.
Terry's books are full of mentions of bodily secretions, Snuff is by no means the first. It's funny when Fred Colon is saved from the dragon in Guards! Guards! only to land in a pile of something soft and smelly. And when the would-be assassin falls foul of Sam Vimes's booby trap and ends up in the cesspit.
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I know. It's mainly the apparent shift of focus in the stories that bugs me:
Discworld started of as pure parody and shifted to what we all knew and love. But recently the stories seem to care more about how many scenes/jokes you'd see enough of in common american (bad) comedies nowadays can be put into the story.
Without even trying to weave them into the story as before.
It might be because I am fed up with all that stupid toilet humour around me in the media* that this gets to me so much.
I think you'd people agree when I say that -showing the audience a pile of shit and tell them to laugh because shit is funny- isn't humour.
*Really, you can't watch germany television anymore without stumbling over that stuff.... Mostly on a children's program. In those live-action Disney shows....
Discworld started of as pure parody and shifted to what we all knew and love. But recently the stories seem to care more about how many scenes/jokes you'd see enough of in common american (bad) comedies nowadays can be put into the story.
Without even trying to weave them into the story as before.
It might be because I am fed up with all that stupid toilet humour around me in the media* that this gets to me so much.
I think you'd people agree when I say that -showing the audience a pile of shit and tell them to laugh because shit is funny- isn't humour.
*Really, you can't watch germany television anymore without stumbling over that stuff.... Mostly on a children's program. In those live-action Disney shows....
Actually Dotsie, there is mention of sex with boys (or grown men looking at boys lustfully) made for laughs in Greek comedy, but I'll stop there because it's beside the point and people are going to think I can only ever talk about drawing and Aristophanes, which is not very far from the truth 
To be honest, I'm a bit uncomfortable about toilet humour myself (though not as much as the poor, poor gentleman who made the reference editions of Aristophanes in the 1920s, and whose pain you can feel through time in the footnotes) and I thought the plot of Snuff lacked purpose and coherence, but if anything I think I would have liked it better if the links between the status of goblins and that of refuse had been made more obvious. Maybe I read it too quickly and missed the subtleties.
PS - I didn't like Unseen Academicals much either
To be honest, I'm a bit uncomfortable about toilet humour myself (though not as much as the poor, poor gentleman who made the reference editions of Aristophanes in the 1920s, and whose pain you can feel through time in the footnotes) and I thought the plot of Snuff lacked purpose and coherence, but if anything I think I would have liked it better if the links between the status of goblins and that of refuse had been made more obvious. Maybe I read it too quickly and missed the subtleties. PS - I didn't like Unseen Academicals much either
As far as I'm aware, you still haven't read Snuff. For someone who hasn't read the book, you have a lot to say about what's in it.
And I disagree with you - you won't be surprised to hear. Honestly, you are making the latest books sound dreadful - they are not. As to your comment: "I think you'd people agree when I say that -showing the audience a pile of shit and tell them to laugh because shit is funny- isn't humour." In which book does Terry do that?
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I'm to page 120 now (need to get it from the library again when I get the chance. It's a wonder they have it. Hadn't had that much time to read as I am looking for a job atm, so you can guess what's taking up my time)
As said, it might be cause I am so sick of that kind of humour from it constantly being forced on me that my view on it differs but, when for example Ridcully has his inner monologue about Rincewind which to me seemed to be just there to explain why it is funny that Rincewind is a cowards and to mention his soiled underwear. (And it completely ignores that the Luggage is a walking laundry so...) Or when they, of all things, point out sport is good for bowel movement. Or when Ponder remembers how he discovered he's a wizard. Burning underpants? Really? I know the smell of both (I told you the people around me are stupid) and burning hair has a far more memorable smell.
And that's just three more harmless ones from one book.
(Frankly, people spent and awful lot of time thinking and talking about underwear and digestion in UA...)
EDIT: And to be honest and perhaps to clarify: It is less the kind of humour used. It's that the story litereally stops for it. Snuff got a bit better with it as far as I am and MM has it drown in the mess of a plot a bit, but dear gods UA (haven't gotten hold of ISWM yet)
As said, it might be cause I am so sick of that kind of humour from it constantly being forced on me that my view on it differs but, when for example Ridcully has his inner monologue about Rincewind which to me seemed to be just there to explain why it is funny that Rincewind is a cowards and to mention his soiled underwear. (And it completely ignores that the Luggage is a walking laundry so...) Or when they, of all things, point out sport is good for bowel movement. Or when Ponder remembers how he discovered he's a wizard. Burning underpants? Really? I know the smell of both (I told you the people around me are stupid) and burning hair has a far more memorable smell.
And that's just three more harmless ones from one book.
(Frankly, people spent and awful lot of time thinking and talking about underwear and digestion in UA...)
EDIT: And to be honest and perhaps to clarify: It is less the kind of humour used. It's that the story litereally stops for it. Snuff got a bit better with it as far as I am and MM has it drown in the mess of a plot a bit, but dear gods UA (haven't gotten hold of ISWM yet)
I've just got back from the pub with the lads I work with, and the topics covered included boobs, willies, and poo. I'm aware that this doesn't make me sound particularly sophisticated, but they weren't the only topics discussed, and they are all under 25
BTW they thought these topics were hilarious - I think I'd rather not comment!
BTW they thought these topics were hilarious - I think I'd rather not comment!
