Terry Pratchett - Master of Fantastic Humour

Terry Pratchett - is the man behind Discworld the ultimate flat-Earther?

By Ali Kayn

Terry has a large, committed (dare we say twisted?) following who happily demand more volumes of series such as Discworld. His particular brand of magic has fans clamouring for more. So much so that his first (teenage) book was recently reprinted - in hardcover. The Carpet People is the adventures of the little people who live in the hall carpet as they struggle to escape the dread scourge - fray.

In Strata he starts with a dinosaur skeleton wearing a watch and suggests that fossils and other proofs of vast planetary age are part of the service provided by custom planet-builders.

Oh yes, this man is absolutely straight-visioned.

When a man tells stories that include dwarves from other planets who live under the floorboards of department stores, lonely computer-game-playing children who rescue the game's characters, chattering nuns, Prince Charles and the four horse riders of the Apocalypse, who would he choose as his favourite creation?

The way Terry Pratchett sees things continues to develop; in the introduction to the revised Carpet People he talks of his changing view of heroism and the rights of Kings. More recently he wrote, "The way I see things has changed the writing process. As you grow older, you learn that life is never as simple as it looks."

"Fantasy" is very much a marketing handle, an easy way to sell, display and list books. But according to Terry, "All fiction is fantasy. I write genre fantasy, or at least disguise what I write as genre fantasy, for its 'wild card' aspects - if I want an animate Death or a talking dog, there are structures that allow this."