Lords and Ladies

Наше сознание творит с нами самые невообразимые вещи. Мы помним только хорошее. Вот драконы, к примеру. Очень романтичные, красивые, полные достоинства зверюги. Но мы забываем, что к этим чертам следует добавить абсолютную прожорливость, мгновенную вос пламеняемость и крайнюю зубастость. А эльфы? Да, они танцуют при луне, поют песни - в общем, веселые, милые существа... Но будете ли вы рады, когда они вернутся? show more О да, эльфы очень любят разные игры - только весело им, а не вам. show less

Отново се пренасяме в Ланкър, който, бидейки едно съвсем малко кралство, е идеален за демонстрация на принципите на държавността в умален, разбираем и несъмнено забавен мащаб.

Основната тема в книгата е обаянието и разминаването му с реалността. Ако мога да бъда извънредно политичен и да доведа метафората на Пратчет до абсурд, който той със сигурност не е мислил, докато е писал книгата (какво е искал да show more каже авторът? мразехте ли го тоя въпрос в училище...) бих стигнал до там да направя пряк паралел на описаните от него елфи, обаятелни, бляскави, които инстинктивно харесваш и затова не виждаш колко всъщност са жестоки, зли и алчни, с политическия термин "фабрика за илюзии" който може да се използва по-широко за описание на цялото политическо ляво, с неговите красиви обещания, загриженост за бедните и онеправданите и като цяло морална извисеност, които пречат на много хора да видят истинската му същност на грабителска, античовешка и неизменно тиранична идеология.

Ебаси дългите изречения измислям.

Освен това няма как да не забележа контраста на кралицата на елфите и мъжа й, които може да се каже, поне за промит с политика мозък като моя, че стоят от двете страни на екстремната идейно-политическа барикада и докато тя е крайното ляво, с нейния омагьосващ но фалшив блясък и летящо влечение към всичко ново, той е крайното дясно с консервативните му, миришещи на некъпан лъв доколенкова мъжественост и земен, космат индивидуализъм. show less

There’s a lot of revelling and a lot of chaos going on in Lords and Ladies. The fourteenth book in the Discworld series and the fourth in the Witches storyline. I’l pass on the warning that Terry Pratchett left on the first pages of this book – while most of the Discworld novels can be read independently, it’s highly recommended to read Witches Abroad before reading Lords and Ladies.

I will say that the only witches book I’ve read is Carpe Jugulum, and I never felt lost reading this one? But the author recommends maybe not picking this up independently so I thought I’d pass that along.

One of my favorite things about Terry Pratchett’s writing is the humor – it’s why I loved The Light Fantastic and what keeps me coming show more back to Discworld. The tone in Lords and Ladies is a bit different. It’s about an upcoming wedding and an elvish invasion and there’s a lot going on. No time, really, for joking around. I wouldn’t call the tone flat out series – I don’t think any of Discworld is serious – but this one takes itself a bit more seriously.

I found myself quite enjoyed Almost-Queen Magrat. She had good growth as a character, and there’s just something totally badass about a young bride digging up old legendary armor and riding a unicorn into battle. You want to turn fantasy royalty on its side and create a powerful female character, Magrat is pretty cool. I always give extra brownie points to the strong female characters in older fantasy, because while these heroines are a dime a dozen now (and so help me, I love them), they were still relatively uncommon in 1992, especially as written by male authors. But it’s not just Magrat that’s impressive – all three of the witches are great. Nanny Ogg, Granny Weatherwax, and Almost-Queen Magrat all brings different things to the table with different styles.

The chaos in Lords and Ladies is like A Midsummer Night’s Dream gone wrong. Instead of friendly tricks and true love woven, with all back to good in the morning… this is a coup. This isn’t the “nice” kind of elves. These are mind-controlling trickster elves. We have three different couples. We have a king and queen of the Fair Folk. We even have a troupe of Rude Mechanicals which, frankly, feel as unessential to the plot here as they did in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I think that overall, this is a wonderful tribute to Shakespeare’s original play. It’s a twisted upside down version, but there are so many parallels and it’s a fun nod to the original story.

My only really complaint about Lords and Ladies is the multitude of characters and names to remember. A lot of them are purposely confusing, like Baker the weaver. There are five POV characters, but scores of other minor, recurring characters. Wedding guests, love interests, townspeople. It’s really difficult to keep track of all the characters and remember what they’re doing and why they’re important. It doesn’t help that sometimes characters are called by their first name, sometimes their last name, and sometimes a nickname or profession. It’s altogether a bit distracting and at times I felt like skipping over scenes that felt unimportant.

As a self-contained story, I really liked this book. The plot was fun. The story went along quickly and the dialogue was light and bantery. I was engaged in the witches themselves and enjoyed the character development from the three of them. The invasion plot line interested me, but the chaos outside of the elves and witches didn’t particularly catch my attention. I don’t think it’s the best of the Discworld novels, but it’s light and fun and tricksy and I enjoyed it for that. show less

Lords and Ladies is Pratchett in the middle of his skills, a confident writer knowing exactly what he wants to say. Granny Weatherwax and the Witches return to Lancre at the height of summer for a royal wedding, but something is wrong. Foolish young girls have been dancing around a ring of standing stones, reality is weakening, and the elves are coming back. This is a witches book, but it brings in the wizards for support as well, and bonus jokes.

It's impossible not to love the witches as characters, or the tiny kingdom of Lancre, but where this book excels is in its depictions of the enemies. Pratchett strips away centuries of fuzzy folklore to get to the essence of elves. They are predators. They think they're naturally better than show more you, and their magic means that you start to think like them. Pratchett compares the elves to wasps and cats, and develops a psuedo-scientific explanation for their weakness to iron and magnetism, and why show less

I love how PTerry throws a little Shakespeare into the witches' novels - first Wyrd Sisters, which riffed on MacBeth, Hamlet and Lear, now Lords and Ladies that brings up A Midsummer Night's Dream, Taming of the Shrew and a little bit of Henry V if you look closely. While it took a while for the Faries to show up, when they did it was totally worth it. It also shows how much of an epic chessmaster Granny Weatherwax is, and how much hidden depth Nanny Ogg has. Kickass.

I said to Brian the other week 'oh, Small Gods, that's my favourite Pratchett!' and he said 'oh, I thought you said it was Lords and Ladies', and I said 'oh, that's wrong'. But reconsidering, it was probably right after all.

What do I love about this book, which I think is a strong contender for my favourite book by my favourite author? Well, it's an engaging, page turning story, how Lancre defends itself about the attack of the elves. And it's funny, and parody, like all Pratchett. But really...

...it's about the themes, themes that resonate and ring true and comfort and help. The main one Granny Weatherwax's story, worrying she is near to death, and looking at all she has sacrificed and never had. The Queen's barb of 'I could show you show more Grandmother Weatherwax'. And the comfort of the trousers of time, the thousands of Granny Weatherwaxes, some of them happy, and this one happy too. Also the burning call that 'the price of being the best is always having to be the best'. Also, Magrat, being squeezed into boxes, but in the boxes finding a story that not all Queens are wimples and embroidery, married in her chainmail and tatted muddy silk, having realized the strength in her core...

Love this book, and love coming back to it. You can't cross the same river twice... Yes you can, there's a bridge. And this book is one of the bridges. show less

"Humans are always lost. It’s a basic characteristic. It explains a lot about them."

This was a reread and I remember enjoying it more the first time round. I wasn't a huge fan of the start (I even considered putting this down - not a usual occurrence with Pratchett for me) but I'm glad I stuck it out because it got more enjoyable when the plot got properly started. I loved reading about Magrat her struggles around adjusting to a royal life and loved that we got to see more of her strength when the other witches weren't constantly putting her down (although their treatment of her still frustrates me having dealt with similarly cruel people). I found the elves interesting and would love to learn more about their world. There is a rather show more emotional moment towards the end and I'm a little surprised at how hard it managed to hit given I had read this before (albeit a few years back).

Overall this was a fun read with some great moments, but it isn't my favourite Discworld book. Maybe it was just a matter of the wrong book at the wrong time in my case, but I know others will absolutely love this one show less