Lessons in Capitalism, A Year on Discworld: Book 15 — Men at Arms
In a quest to escape the reality of 2020 and recapture my youth, I’ve set myself the goal of reading all 41 Discworld novels in one year. Join me on this voyage of discovery which definitely isn’t a complete waste of time. Mild spoilers, probably.
No sooner did I put down Men At Arms than I had picked up my phone to read the news Dominic Cummings had broken lockdown. The question lead characters and men of the watch Sam Vimes and Carrot Ironfoundersson ask of Ankh Morpork Patrician was still playing on my mind.
Each Nightwatchman asks Lord Vetinari if he knows where the word “policeman” comes from? The answer is the word polis, meaning city, hence policeman means man of the city. Vetinari later replies to Carrot if he aware politician is also derived from polis, one inference being while the law protects the city, politics is how it works. The consequences of those two ideas being apart is really quite upsetting the more the think about, which everyone in the UK is having ample time to do right now.
“If you had enough money, you could hardly commit crimes at all. You just perpetrated amusing little peccadilloes.”
Contemporary synchronicity aside for a moment, Men at Arms follows Ankh Morporks Nightwatch take on more diverse lance corporal, (a troll, a dwarf and…A WOMAN) as Sam Vimes begins to retire and a series of illegal assassinations begging to take place — quite different from the perfectly legal assassinations Morporkians are used to.
Like it’s Watch predecessor Guards, Guards! here Pratchett is exploring the world of politics through the Disc. And while last time I was a little scared he might be wandering in areas I’d rather not follow, Men at Arms is much clearer about what he wants to say. One quote from Vimes hit hard was, “If you had enough money, you could hardly commit crimes at all. You just perpetrated amusing little peccadilloes.” And, famously this book features the “Captain Samuel Vimes “Boots” theory of socioeconomic unfairness”, pretty much the best example of why the poor can never become rich;
“A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.”
But aside from it being a pretty accurate critique of modern politic despite being written 27-years ago, I enjoyed Men at Arms for other reasons. Firstly, it reasserted my love of dwarves, which is always pleasant. And after lots of witches, theology and Death, it was nice to return to a crime story. Fifteen books in, it’s starting to become clear what Pratchett wants to do by which set of characters he is using, and the Watch is as close to his hardboiled detective/police procedural as he can get. It’s pretty admirable he was able to build a huge but consistent fantasy world and use it not just to address different issues and themes, but also to play in different genres.
There is a theme in the Watch books that Carrot, a naive but likeable watchman, believes in following the letter of the law and that he is essentially a good policeman. I’ve always been a little suspicious of policemen but accepting of their necessity, adhering to the idea that anyone who wanted to be a policeman shouldn’t be allowed. But detectives, now there is something romantic about being a detective. I wanted to be a detective and genuinely considered how to go about it after university. The two huge drawbacks where I couldn’t and still can’t drive, and you’d have to spend some time being a policeman first. Something I was not prepared to do.
It wasn’t because I worried about the systematic issue of modern policing, I’m not that noble, it’s because they essentially have to be people persons and calmly deal with drunks, idiots, louts, and the general kind of uncivil type of people it feels wrong to honour with the word “criminal”. I guess that’s what so why I’ve enjoyed the detective aspects of the Watch books so far, it’s a little hint at what life had might have been like if only I’d been slightly more tolerant of the annoying.
Once again I have fallen in the space between books and I am reading The Long Ship by Frans G. Bengtsson as I wait for my next Pratchett to arrive. At this point, I’m starting to worry about that I’m not looking for current affairs or past nostalgia to match up with which Discworld novel I’m reading, I’m starting to worry the books are decided what reality should be, meaning Maskerade could have some startling revelations.
