Too Clever to be Smart, A Year on Discworld: Book 6 — Wyrd Sisters
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.
Before I begin, some upkeep. This post is over a week late — or several days early depending on your concept of time. But provided you are a regular human with a regular faculty for understanding time, I’m falling behind. The main reasons for this are A) I’m writing a book and that takes time B) I’m still looking for a job (which also takes time) C) I launched a comic book and D) Wyrd Sisters is slightly longer than the other Discworld novels I’ve digested on this year-long feast of the fantastic.
The eagle-eyed among you will have noticed I’ve changed the format of the titles in the series, replacing “Week” and it’s a temporal dictatorship with “Book”, generally, a more agreeable and flexible term. It’s no big deal than it stops me from feeling terrible about this whole endeavour by giving myself a work-like deadline.
Normally, I give a small summary for the plot of each novel I read but, and I write this with fear of Pratchett backlash (Pratt-lash?), Wyrd Sisters is a mess. It’s easier to say what it’s parodying than to summarise the plot. It’s Macbeth and Hamlet in a blender, with just a seasoning of King Lear, told from the perspective of the witches, in this case, Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg and Magrat Garlick.
My life is a mess and for the most part, I enjoy that.
Now, just because it’s a mess, that doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it. My life is a mess and for the most part, I enjoy that, or I don’t want it to terminate anytime soon at least. I get the feeling there is a good book in Wyrd Sisters somewhere, just an awful lot of other words are getting in the way. Let me explain why it’s messy without getting into hyper-specifics.
It meanders in the middle, the story of the Mad Duke and the boy who would be king feel like two separate plots trapped in the same book, the ghost thing doesn’t go anywhere, it uses time-travel (kinda) as a plot device (a personal bugbear), the ending is deeply unsatisfying and, my edition has at least one typo which confuses the characters, Granny and Nanny, only one of whom is in the scene in question which makes me think the parts of the book when I asked myself, “Wait… what?” are neither mine nor Pratchett’s fault but Corgi publishing’s.
The problem is what happens when those characters aren’t around.
One thing that did strike me, is something I’ve only noticed from reading so much Pratchett at once. Pratchett often gives lead characters his voice, or at least, the voice that questions assumptions about how the world is. Rincewind, Death and Granny Weatherwax all perform this function. Their speech, though individual, feels closest to the authorial, disembodied voice telling the rest of the story. The problem is what happens when those characters with that voice aren’t around. In the case of Wyrd Sisters, it descends into a confused, hectic arrangement of character whom you don’t particularly care about. This maybe excludes Hwel, the dwarven playwright with more inspiration than talent.
On the other hand, when Weatherwax is around, sparing with Magrat and Ogg in their newly formed coven, it’s great. The balance of those three characters and their relationships with one another is brilliant. Of the six books I’ve read so far, those three characters feel like the first to have a real history and complex relationship with one another… maybe Death and his horse Binky have it too.
I even enjoyed when we read Chaucer, despite the fact it’s essentially incomprehensible gobbledegook.
I suspect Wyrd Sisters is popular. It has this air of credibility. I may be imagining that, but if I’m not, I think it’s because of its literary allusions. But that’s a double-edged sword. The brief mentions of Oliver and Hardy, The Marx Brothers and Charlie Chaplin elicited an excitable response from me. I’m generally not one for the type of nostalgia reducible to, “ I’m excited because I recognise that thing” but it was an unexpected treat Alternatively, the Shakespearean gags received one of three responses ;
1 — “Heh, oh yeah, that.”
2 — “ Okay, we get it.”
3 — “Must be a Shakespeare thing.” Googles it. “Oh, it is. That was smart without being funny.”
I’m certain Pratchett fans and Shakespeare buffs might hate me and think me a philistine but I think it’s a gamble to rely on that technique.
Pratchett takes recognisable aspect of various Shakespearean tragedies, boils them in a cauldron and comes out with a farce.
As this entire challenged is fueled by some desire to recapture the excitement of youth I ended up asking some questions about my relationship with Shakespeare. I knew enough of the references to get the gags or recognised them something I would understand if I knew more Shakespeare. Looking back, I realised I enjoyed reading Shakespeare in school. In fact, I think I enjoyed every book I was forced to read in school. The few I can remember objecting to, I did so on intellectual grounds ( it was the intellect of a teenager mind, so intellect could be too strong a word) not because they were boring. I even enjoyed reading Chaucer, despite the fact it’s essentially incomprehensible gobbledegook. I even recall being annoyed, though keeping schtum, when other kids would moan to the teacher about the books we were reading. I may have been a goodie-two-shoes, but I knew snitches get stitches.
Part of the reason this book is messy is Pratchett takes recognisable aspects of various Shakespearean tragedies, boils them in a cauldron and comes out with a farce. At the same time, he has Hwel, the playwright, do the same thing. Now, making fun of something while doing it yourself, whether it’s intentional or not, doesn’t excuse you from doing it.
Maybe if I’d loved Shakespeare rather than just enjoyed it and passionately committed parts of it to memory I would have engaged with how Pratchett played with those elements. Maybe I’m just not smart enough to get it. But It feels like the writer was getting in the way of a good story, I’m just not sure if that writer was named William or Terry.
