The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret - 38: Witches Abroad Pt.1 (With Your Boots On)

Episode Date: December 7, 2020

The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret is a podcast in which your hosts, Joanna Hagan and Francine Carrel, read and recap every book from Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in chronological order. This week, Part 1 of our recap of “Witches Abroad”. Mirrors! Magic! Sausage?Find us on the internet:Twitter: @MakeYeFretPodInstagram: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretFacebook: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretEmail: [e-mail] to follow your hosts and their internet doings? Follow Joanna on twitter @joannahagan and follow Francine @francibambi Things we blathered on about:Rasputin – Boney M. (Dance Cale Brown) TikTok - YouTubeThe Joylessness of Cooking - The New YorkerWitches Abroad - Colin Smythe Limited (scroll down for reviews) The Annotated Pratchett File - Witches AbroadLilith - Bible Archeology SocietyTransylvania etymology - WikipediaCram - Tolkien GatewayTraditional Toum (Lebanese Garlic Sauce) Recipe - Serious EatsCover mirrors in a storm - USC Digital Folklore ArchivesAfrican-American and Creole Traditions Surrounding Death in the Cane River Region - NCPTTUrban Legends Spectacular! - You’re Wrong AboutMusic: Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com 

I didn't realise just how much inspiration I had taken from this book until I re-read it and went, oh, well, it wasn't plagiarism. Just check with my lawyer. No, no, not plagiarism. Inspiration. What did we say we were going to talk about? God, I don't know. My mental health's on fire. That's fun. Oh, yeah, yeah, that's right. How's that? It's actually, you know, it's not so bad today. I worked out where I was treating myself badly and started being a bit gentler with myself. Can you reveal? Oh, no, just things like, so for two weeks of, so four listeners, we're recording this over a week before it comes out because we're trying to be efficient. Yeah, we did that for a while at the start of the podcast and we're...

At one point, we were a month ahead. Yeah, I didn't care for that. No, it didn't really work. So we're just coming to the end of lockdown two, Electric Boogly. And yeah, for two weeks of it, I like really intensely worked on the web development course I was doing and was very proud of myself for that. And then I've kind of realized this week, like making myself do that much work every day was actually not helping me because I was beating myself up if I couldn't get through like four units a day. And that probably hasn't helped with my brain. So I'm just being a bit gentler with myself. Yeah, well, you're going back to work next week anyway, aren't you? So rest a little bit first. Yes, I'm giving myself a little exhale

weekend. Yeah, done very well, though. You've done HTML and CSS and started the awful void that is JavaScript. Oh, I've been doing... What was I doing? Like Axios and Async functions. And I'm learning about APIs and my head hurts just a lot. I have a very sore brain. But yeah, so not saying my mental health is shaky, but that TikTok of the guy dancing to Rara Rasputin has... I've watched it probably more times than is healthy. I think that's a kind of universal good though, that video. Yeah, I'm like, I would highly distrust anyone who disliked it. Yeah, but there's liking it and there's watching it 18 times. Yeah, which is not the number of times I've watched it. Or there's liking it and there's looking at cowboy boots on eBay because

I want to try and reenact it. I'm not doing that. Well, you made me watch Hamilton and then I bought Jodpas, so I really can't judge. Yes, but the Jodpas really suit you. I need... Well, I have boots to go with them actually, but then my walking boots. So I can't wear the Jodpas anywhere, but on dog walks, which is fine. I mean, where am I going to wear Jodpas? Well, yeah, it's not like you go horse riding. Yeah. Yeah, part of the mental health thing. I really like that article you sent me on the cooking fatigue because I really liked it. I felt seen. Yeah, the Helen Rosner one. We'll link to this in the show notes and it was just a really... She's an amazing food writer. She's one of my favourites and the entire reason I've considered a subscription to the New Yorker.

But she wrote about how she's just sick of food and cooking and making meals and thinking about it every day in the weird COVID times because it is fatiguing even if... And I fucking love food and cooking. It is my favourite thing and even I'm sick of it. Yeah. Yeah, you started on a much higher baseline than I did of the tolerance for having to cook nice meals. Yeah. I'm just... A few weeks ago, I said, I just hit a wall on it. I was like, Jack, I can't cook this week. Yeah. Jack, for listeners, it's not some horrible 50s. The husband, he just works far, far, far more hours than I do. So I just went by cooking. But yeah, that was like, yeah, we're getting takeaway for a week. Sorry, dude. Yeah, that's fair. Actually, to be fair, as much as I'm sick of it, I am

cooking with... Because it's a Saturday today, I'm going to cook myself a very delicious dinner tonight and I'm very excited. What is it? Well, so because Waitrose fucked up and sent me rib eye steaks instead of short ribs, I am having steak with a parsnip and potato rosti and some a nice red wine sauce and some cavolinoero and chestnut mushrooms. Yeah. Gently suggest this kind of thing is why you've got cooking fatigue. Yeah. Like the other day I was like... I'm gonna have fish and chips. The other day I was... We went for a walk together and then I was really tired and I was like, I can't be asked to cook anything wonky. I'm just going to make myself a lazy pasta thing. So I defrosted a salmon fillet and had to salmon, mascarpone and caramelised fennel pasta and I

am just really bad at like... That sounds fancy, but I could make that which means it's your kind of lazy cooking. Although I can stir mascarpone, I can caramelised fennel, I can defrost salmon. Yes. That's a lie, I usually just stick it in the instant pot because I forget to defrost it. I would do that if I had an instant pot. I get groceries delivered like once every couple of weeks and I have taken to normally on a Sunday because that's sort of my day off, day off. I've taken to putting an oven pizza in my grocery delivery. So once every two weeks I have a little lazy Sunday night where I have an oven pizza in a bit. Do you have a favourite? I sound like such a posh wanker but waitries do this like mushroom mascarpone one that I love. I like the

feta or something and caramelised onions one they do as well, ricotta I think. They don't do my favourite garlic bread any more and that makes me really sad. They used to do a really nice roasted garlic flatbread. Oh yeah, did they not do that? Well I haven't seen it on the website. I also started my Christmas grocery order which basically means I've just ordered seven kinds of cheese and two bowls of champagne. Sweet. Oh and a leg of mutton but that's coming from a bit. Good. So if our listeners weren't aware I am a colossal wanker. I know mutton's not wanky food, mutton's just, mutton's good sort of the earth food isn't it? Yeah, the way I'm going to cook it is going to be wanky. What's that other one? There's lamb,

there's mutton and what's the old one called? Hoggit. Hoggit, yeah I had that once. Hoggit's nice. Hoggit's younger than mutton I think. How is that? Yeah I think hoggit's so lamb is if it's less than a year old and then hoggit's if it's a year or above and then mutton is like two years or above I want to say. And sometimes they just get chunks of sheep brought home from the farm so. It happens to the best of us. And I go by how they smell obviously as I don't eat them but that smelled very nice when I made interest you. I once in a kitchen I worked in had a whole hoggit unexpectedly delivered one morning and had to wrestle it down into. The hoggit and unexpected delivery. Oh we sat in the Lord of the Rings references early then. Oh yes.

So yes that was a strange morning in my life especially as I was very hung over. Anyway. As we have things to do later shall we grab a coffee and then think about. Should we make a podcast? Yeah I think we should. That sounds like a sound plan. Okay. If it fits in with your self-care routine. Making a podcast is self-care. Okay. Hello and welcome to the Trishamiki Fret, a podcast in which we're reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series one us a time in chronological order. I'm Joanna Hagen. And I'm Francine Carroll. And this is part one of our discussion of which is abroad. Hell yes. Although for some reason I wrote Weird Systems in the show plan.

I'm going to make that mistake a lot and I don't know why. Well you did didn't you? Well I didn't notice it either so that's fine. Excellent. Note on spoilers before we get started. This is a spoiler light podcast. Obviously heavy spoilers for the book we're on which is abroad. But we will avoid spoiling any major future events in the Discworld series and we're saving any and all discussion of the final Discworld book The Shepherd's Crown until we get there so you dear listener can come on the journey with us. A journey on kind of questionably quality, broom questionably quality, broomsticks of questionable quality and hopefully not over too many waterfalls. Not too many waterfalls. But a follow-up, some dispatches from the round world.

Some people have been lovely on Reddit including... Which is an announcement in itself, isn't it? Yeah. Dungeon Master said something lovely about reaching out to us and referred to us as Glorious Hosts which just if anyone's listening we like that as a nickname. Yeah I know. Glorious is a nice adjective. And Madjo who is not me pointed out that Vermean were first mentioned in the First Witches book. Weird Sisters? No because it was First Witches book. It was Margaret who was wondering about them. Quite right. Yes. See I know that. I've read that the other day. And Kate said she really liked the term Grief Sherpa. Shout out to Kate. A couple of people have offered to be historical researchers and PhD researchers for us and we can pay.

Well I shared something on Twitter about Your Dead To Me which I've talked about a lot as one of my favourite history podcasts in that research process. Obviously theirs involves like six PhD students. That involves us googling things and normally linking to a Wikipedia page. I have many arcane books I'll have you know. It's just harder to link to in the show loads. I normally end up consulting Brewers at least once a book. Oh and we got a lovely email from Stephen, Hi Stephen who has promised to send us some traditional Australian cinema snacks via Albatross including the Choctop and the Phantale. I'm not sure if I'm saying Phantale right. I don't know if it's Phantale. I don't think I've ever tried Australian cinema snacks. That's very exciting.

So the Choctop is like a Mr Whippy from the Linksea Centre. The Choctop is like a Mr Whippy but with like a hard shell of chocolate on top. So I'm very into this. Have you ever had that? No you wouldn't have because you've not read that. My favourite Australian ice cream was the Golden Gay Time. Which is really called that and which is just as good as the name suggests. I am just not going to say anything. But you're allowed. As the resident podcast queer I am. I set you up. I'm not allowed to make jokes. Look I'd love a Golden Gay Time but unfortunately there's a pandemic. There we go. And Phantales, Phantales whatever they are. I like little chocolate covered caramels that come in a bag so I quite want to try those. Thank you Stephen. He also pointed out I've been

thinking about Wendell Poones being such a different character and Reaper Man once he's dead. And thinking about what Mark Byra said about how sort of Victor and Tepik are all this one character. He says Wendell Poones almost seems like an undead version of that although he's obviously not young. My favourite part of Stephen's email. I wonder whether these characters represent the reader since they often seem to be a bit bewildered by what's going on. Get thrust into a role they didn't ask for and need to have things to explain to them. Which is quite a lovely way to look at it and think about it. I think that's definitely got legs because in the early early books I would say that kind of rinse wind and two flowers switched places in that role. Yeah.

And then perhaps equal rights it was Granny Weatherwax but yeah no I'd say it's the straight man trope isn't it. Yeah I agree. So yes I enjoyed that email thank you Stephen. And I think that's all my dispatches from the round world so shall we crack on would you like to introduce us to the book which is a broad Francine. Sure I like which the broad. It was published in November 1991 because Terry Pratchett was just insanely prolific really quite offensive. Which the broad is the twelfth deathwell novel and the third in the witches arc or the second proper witches book you could say because it's got Nanny and Magra and the more powerful version of Granny who's kind of toned down a lot in equal rights. The title is of course a

pune or a play on words. Articular witches are both abroad in foreign parts and abroad at large. I'd say overall it's like a more cohesive story than Reaper Man. So the comedy and the tragedy it's got that same balance but it's in the same plot line. Yeah there's no real B plot to this. Yeah I suppose some of the events in January are a bit B plotty but it all comes together very quickly. Yeah I mean by part three all of the B plots are. Yeah it's all with the A plots making an ab plot. That is definitely a proper writing term. As I was saying it I realised that was not something I should say. So when it was released it seemed to have some positive reviews. I found one I particularly liked Steve Green writing in Critical Wave with limited foresight.

Which of the broad proves there's still a little mileage left in the discworld mythos. It was adapted to the stage did you know that. Yes I haven't seen any adaptation quite a lot of them have been adapted in various ways. It was by the what you call them players in 97 was the one I was reading about because Pratchett recommended it because he went twice to the performance of Lords and Ladies. Yeah. He came the second time he liked it so. Wow. Finally I could travel back to 1997 I would indeed take that recommendation. Yep I would travel back to 1997. If anybody has a VHS tape or similar please Albatross it over. I mean do either of us have VHS players. I would get one to watch that.

Actually yeah I definitely would. This is a really exciting one for me to talk about because I've talked about my discworld origin story on the podcast various times where I sort of read them all out of order because I'd read Amazing Morris as a Kid and then I started picking them up and the first one I picked up was Soul Music because someone recommended it because I really liked the Blues Brothers and then the next one I picked up because I was dating someone who had all the books and so I was just grabbing ones that looked interesting off the shelf was this one. So I read this before I read Weird Sisters or Equal Rights. This was my first introduction to the witches. And the good thing is it really doesn't matter. They do all sort of stand up and

stand alone and do what they need to do and I especially this one as compared to the other witches ones because none of what happened in Weird Sisters really impacts this apart from perhaps the three witches are more friends than they would have been at the start. Yeah I think Weird Sisters establishes the dynamic quite well but you don't need to have read that to see the dynamic in this. It's very well written as an individual story. Yeah for sure. It was interesting going back and rereading it later on once I had the context of the previous books. Yeah because I understood a bit more about Magra but yeah. Right do you want to summarize then and we'll get into it. Yeah so in this section of the book

which goes up to page 87 in the Corgi paperback we begin with the turtle chaos and the nature of stories in a far off swamp gods are made as a hat coat and mirror affixed to a stake on a bare mountain which is meat. We witnessed Desderata Hollow's last moments as she confronts the mysterious Lilith in the mirror and provides death with some handy exposition about how stories work. Lady Lilith to Thamesir stands between her mirrors while on the mountain the witches gathered for the Sabbath complain about the lack of new blood. Granny and Nanny agree to check in on Desderata's cottage where Albert Hurker has just collected a mysterious package for delivery. In the morning Granny and Nanny search the cottage for a mysterious something and a mirror

meets its fate. Meanwhile Magra in search of herself has her martial arts practice interrupted by a special delivery from Hurker. Wondering what to do with the magic wand and the not so helpful letter from Desderata she goes to the cottage and of course happens upon Granny and Nanny who learn that Magra is now a fairy godmother and must go to Genua and stop someone from marrying a prince. Of course they offer to lend their considerable expertise to the endeavour. The ragtag bunch of magical mavens set off on their broomsticks for Genua, Nanny in fetching new red boots and a specially reinforced hat and Magra terrifyingly bifurcated. We learn about the nature of mirrors and magic as Magra and Nanny and Granny continue on with their journey. Trapped

in a frozen mountain pass they find themselves seeking assistance from dwarfs and helping in return with a terrifying mind collapse. Magra's magic wand skills leave something to be desired but the pumpkin transformation frees the dwarfs and the gang head off on their merry way in a handy little boat. A waterfall nearly takes out the intrepid travellers but pumpkin save the day once more. Lily keeps an eye on the gang with her mirror magic and chats mystical exposition with the complaining Duke. In a royal audience the Duke and Lily punish a toy maker for crimes against narrative. Mrs Pleasant the palace cook goes to visit her good friend Mrs Gogal and the swamp. Gogal invites Mrs Pleasant to watch for witches. Magra and Nanny and Granny get lost in a gothic

forest before making their way to a mysteriously garlicky town. Strangely after Grubo it's about the town is a much happier place and after an umper celebration Nanny invents the postcard and the witches fly on. So helicopter and line cloth watch brimsticks are performing the duty of helicopters for this second. Other things that we've been sort of keeping track on we open on the turtle again and death is around. Yes a little later we'll see oh no we've seen him already haven't we? Yes we have seen him we've seen him with Destorata yes so we haven't had a book without death yet but so far not been twang more pork. Oh yeah huh yes it has been mentioned yes but that's as far as it's gone yeah. So quotes your favorite quote is definitely before mine.

Yeah that's right at the beginning I rather liked Pratchett's Pratchett clearly kind of had a bit of a rant inside him that he just needed to get out with a tenuous connection to what we're on about. Talking about scientists who used to look for little bits of gold knowledge amongst gravel of uncertainty and such was. But the trouble was the ignorance became more interesting especially big fascinating ignorance about huge and important things like matter and creation and people stopped patiently building their little houses of rational sticks in the chaos of the universe and started getting interested in the chaos itself partly because it was a lot easier to be an expert on chaos but mostly because it made really good patterns that you could put

on a t-shirt. I like that bit. Yes it kind of seems to share my slight horror and fascination with that whole area of physics that I won't ever be able to grasp. That's uh that was something I think I had a similar thing as one of my favorite quotes from equal rights which is a conversation after young Simon has taught class at the university all the wizards are going well now I'm knowledge now when I'm very confused about the big fundamental important things about the universe which makes me very superior to people who are only confused about little things. Exactly so yes. Yes I enjoy Pratchett brings that up quite a few times and he's always quite scathing about it. Yes well at the same time clearly having a fondness for it. Yeah go on. Okay yeah so mine is

right near the end. Yeah mine's right near the end of the section. Most people on waking up accelerate through a quick panicky pre-consciousness checkup. Who am I? Where am I? Who is he? She? Good God why am I cuddling for a policeman's helmet? What happened last night? And this is because people are riddled by doubt. It is the engine that drives them through their lives. It is the elastic band in the little model aeroplane of their soul and they spend their time winding it up until until it knots. Early morning is the worst time. There's that little moment of panic in case you have drifted away in the night and someone else has moved in. This never happened to Granny Weatherwax. She went straight from fast asleep to instant operation on all six cylinders.

She never needed to find herself because she always knew who was doing the looking. Wouldn't that be nice? Yeah speaking as someone who always like I very rarely even minus the pandemic have the sort of morning where I wake up and go oh god where am I who's that why have I got this? Yeah. But even so I still tend to wake up in a bit of a panic. Yeah just general background panic rinse windowsk. Yeah. Should I be running? Yes. What is this? Yeah it's a very nice way to kind of summarise Granny's self-possessed nature. Yes. So going on to characters. Yes I thought we'd start with our lovely Desderata Hollow. Is that how we're saying it? Desderata? Yes. That makes sense. Cool. I like that she was given the advice of never trust a dog with

orange eyebrows always get the young man's name and address never get between two mirrors and always wear clean underwear every day because you never know when you're going to be knocked down and killed by a runaway horse and if people found she had unsatisfactory underwear on you'd die of shame. Quite. But luckily she's become a witch knows exactly when she's going to die and can wear whatever underwear she likes. Exactly. Do you have a pair that you would definitely wear? I don't know. What kind of underwear do you want to be wearing when you die? Do you want it to be pretty or just really comfy? I think probably a mix between the both. Not granny pants but I don't want to be dying in the laundry. I want something that's going to be comfy if it comes

with me to the afterlife and doesn't have any holes in. Like seamless black decent shape. I have some really pretty 50 style high waisted ones actually. I think that would be a good choice. Cool. I'm glad we got that sorted. Yeah that was the important thing. I like Desturasa for someone who's only actually in the book for a few pages. She's got that witchy confidence that Pratchett writes very well. There's a really lovely line about her. She says that Lilith has a bee in her bonnet about it. That she was not someone to use extreme language but it was possible to be sure that when she deployed a mild term like a bee in her bonnet she was using it to define someone whom she believed to be several miles over the madness horizon and accelerate

it. I love people who can do that, who can use such a mild term and make it sound much worse than any big sweary insult. Yes definitely. I think we've got a couple of friends who could do that. One of our American friends Tiffany I think. Oh yeah she is the sweetest. I would add more weight to her words than most people's. She was the sort of sweetest most good natured person and if she ever sort of said well I don't care for that while quietly taking a sip of her tea that was oh gosh everyone would clutch the fouls. The pub would go quiet. Oh I miss those people. I really miss her Tiffany. But yeah so there's an interesting bit in Desturasa where she sort of talks about the nature of fairy godmothering and the fact that there has to be two of them.

Yeah it's a mirror. Mirror image rather than the usual trio. Yeah which I quite like is adding to the mythos within this book. It's never explained is it how Desturasa ends up being a fairy godmother. One can assume that Lele sort it out. Yeah I assume Desturasa became a fairy godmother in a very similar way to how she makes Magra as a fairy godmother. Oh someone went you all go. Yeah so sticking with the witches obviously we have the Sabbath on the mountaintop. Mother Dismiss makes me giggle. Oh she's great. We used to have one of those but the bit you unscrew fell off and we lost it. Temporarily unfocused. So you just sort of say things and hope at some point she passes through and catches them.

It does remind me of our conversations if we try and talk when we're too tired. Yeah they're wild disconnects. That hoping eventually we'll kind of fix on to what the other one's saying. Note some of our early podcast episodes. Yes. Then who else obviously Nani August here. We love Nani August. I like that as they're all sat there having this very serious conversation about you know not having enough young witches Nani August just throwing in anyone bring me marshmallows. Yeah it's like this may be the end of witchcraft in these parts. Or I could do with snack. There's also alongside Nani August there's a more thorough description of the Ogg clan. Oh yes one of your favourites. What's it is it a trope even. I don't know a

device. Yeah all the devices. The Oggs were what is known as an extended family in fact not only extended but elongated, protracted and persistent. No normal sheet of paper could possibly trace their family tree which in any case was more like a mangrove thick thicket and every single branch had a low key chronic vendetta against every other branch based on such well well established course as what they're Kevin said about our stand at a cousin dies wedding who got the silver country that auntie and promised our Doreen was to have after she died I'd like to know thank you very much if you don't mind. All capitalised. Yeah and I love this idea of Nani August is this matriarch of this whole clan just randomly encourages the fights for shits and giggles.

Yeah makes me wonder like whether she took a more active petty role as she was growing up and just kind of grew into this position or whether she's always had the knack for it. I would say she's probably always because she's a witch I think she's always had the knack for it. I reckon yeah. Especially down to her that the clan is so large in some ways I'm assuming. Yeah I don't think we actually get an explanation of how many children or as she's had or how many husbands she's had. Several. Many. And then obviously one of our all-time faves Granny Weatherwax. Hooray. Love her. Star of the show. Absolute star of the show. One of my favourite moments of hers is when so Margaret has turned up has been given this note from Destorata saying

whatever you do don't let her get involved. Inferring or Bezham or something. Yes and obviously that's because she wants Nani to get that's because she wants Granny to get involved and that's the best way. There's a moment where Margaret turns up and Nani and Granny reads the note that says don't let her get involved. Yeah. And you can see almost get not briefly a tiny bit off her axis and then immediately she says no. So Destorata says we're supposed to help Margaret and Margaret kind of just goes yeah right. That seems like an argument that is going to be more trouble than just going with you okay. It's amazing because like maybe it's a bit deeper than it looks but Granny Weatherwax and Nani Og both have you know fantastic knowledge of headology and they can

work incredibly complicated psychological tricks and everyone else but the basic reverse psychology works perfectly on them every time. They are both their own blind spots. Yeah. And I think that's really good. The relationship between Nani and Granny as well. Oh yeah I just I thought it was almost summed up by the introduction which was and Granny really couldn't be having it all with Nani Og who was her best friend but like in the cottage their interactions in there are fantastic and then just the constant little bickering. Exactly but they've been at odds and then suddenly they're on the same team when it comes to bullying Margaret and giving the one over and then sharing a bed and like are you wearing your boots? Are you eating garlic

sausage? I feel like this is what our friendship will be as we get older. It is definitely goals. Squad goals. Right yeah so Nani and Granny squad goals. I don't think either of us have ever said squad goals out loud before and I don't think we ever should again. No I don't regret it but I shouldn't be revisiting it. Yeah say Margaret. So yes third part so putting the focus on someone even more embarrassing than me. Margaret is not attending the Sabbath because she's busy finding herself. Yes. For those wondering what was sort of going on after the events of Weird Sisters she's decided not to get married to the king because she refuses to be a sex object. There's another one of my favorite Granny and Nani little interactions is and please say I don't even know

sex object is said Granny whether that's family. I do. So yeah so I like the, we've talked about the inspiration past schools on the on the podcast before and Margaret is one of those people who has such an open mind that they all sort of turn up. Another one of these recurring concepts. She also just gets a little throwaway line that I love which is when she's delivered the magic wand and Hercules. Well I was told to give me a penny and she just very calmly said oh yes money forges the chains which bind the labouring class as she hands over. Yes such a twat. We all know someone who's a bit like that though. Yeah but just give them out a penny for she's done please. So yes she makes, I love her. I have such sympathy for her

because I think we've all been that person who's had a moment of right now I must find myself. Oh yeah many of them. I wonder what would happen if she ever met Twoflower. Dithering. So so much dithering but the inspiration particles Joanna. They would just dither. Ah Jason. Ah Jason bless Ah Jason. Ah Jason is one of Naniog's sons. Apparently he doesn't look as if he could have been born but as if he must have been constructed in a shipyard. So he's the town blacksmith and farrier. No particularly for his skills with awkwardness. He knows the horseman's word which is actually just him threatening to slam the balls on an anvil but apparently it works. Well it would wouldn't it if you could get it across somehow.

It's very sweet when Nani's saying oh I'm probably going to make my fortune when I go away and if you won't have to go to the forge ever again but I like it and then obviously Griebo's here we love Griebo the cat. Going to massive softies. Yes he's an old softie really. He will come back with renewed figure. Well he plays a heroic part in this part doesn't he he kills the vampire. Yes unknowingly. Not unknowingly but still he can be an accidental hero I think. Yep and then obviously the big one Lady Lilith to Tamsir. Is it a spoiler to say the villain of the piece is quite clearly villainous isn't she. Yeah I think from moment one she is. I looked at the first name because I knew that Lilith was Adam's first wife

before Eve and when Adam wanted her to be the good subservient wife Lilith grew wings and flew away. Yes the Lilith myth is really fascinating. Yeah but yeah apparently it probably came from even older stories so it was a Babylonian seductive demoness called Lilithu that she was probably based on. Yeah it's interesting. It's a good name but yeah she's not her name. She's an interesting character. She thinks a wishy washy overgrown girl more suited to the attentions of a fairy godmother than being one. A little old washerwoman type who got drunk and sang songs and the other one. Yes and Lilith is obviously very big into this evil mirror magic expanding her powers. The Duke. So I'm saying yeah is it meant to be duck or Duke?

I think given all the word play it's meant to be duck. Okay I'm gonna say Duke because I refuse to just say duck that many times in this podcast. Okay fine. So he is very handsome but has to wear smoked glasses because we can't really do anything about his eyes. Yes. He is very whiny. Isn't he though? So he is so Lilith is obviously the what's it the eminence grace. Yes. So the the duck's ruling over January and then we've got Mrs Pleasant the palace cook who was very stereotypical cook, flowery arms and all. Yep because she has to be. She took great care to bustle and stays fancy and is lucky. Oh actually yes Lilith is very obviously the villain because she's cutting off people's heads for stop imprisoning them

for being the wrong kind of toy maker. For crimes against narrative. Yes yeah. Where else are we? Yeah so Mrs Pleasant takes care to say things like lorks. Oh yes. And then we obviously with how we meet Mrs Gogol is obviously a witch of this particular area. Yeah. Makes a damn good gumbo. Yep. Have you ever had gumbo? I have. I like gumbo and jambola. I want it. I've had gumbo. This book is why I ended up looking up flights to New Orleans. But yes it's the future. She spotted in a bowl of jambola but she pretended it was happening in the gumbo. I'm not going to try and imitate any of the accents between the two of them because our listeners just don't deserve that. No no I think I don't think we could do that any justice

or in any way that wasn't incredibly problematic so. Exactly so I'm going to wait and talk about both of them. Don't cat us it's so important. So I'm going to wait and talk about them a bit more when we get on to the next section because they have a lot more to do here but they're keeping an eye out for the witches. Yeah. And then last little character moment I want to mention this made me very excited for all of you who remember that during moving pictures I became a very big fan of Mrs Cosmopolite. She gets a mention. Yay. Because everyone to determine seekers after wisdom no where they no matter where they happen to be they'll always seek that wisdom which is a long way off because wisdom is one of the things that looks bigger the further way it is.

So there is a sect of people who follow the way of Mrs Cosmopolite. They've developed a special branch of martial arts based on their experiences where they're shouting comprehensively at one another and then hit their opponent with a broom. Perfect. I don't see any problem with this. I am very happy for Mrs Cosmopolite one of my favorite parts of moving pictures because she now seems to have accidentally formed a cult and really I think that's what she deserves. I don't think it's what she wants. Well no but it's still nice for her. I'm glad some people appreciate the wisdom of Mrs Cosmopolite. I myself follow the way of Mrs Cosmopolite. Locations Joanna before you start flailing around with the broom again. No it's fine the broom's outside. Bear Mountain.

So-called because it's bear not because it has a lot of bears but no one's correcting this better. Yes this works better in text. Yeah this doesn't really work on the podcast. This is where the witches meet for the Sabbath. There's also on that bit a fun little uh footnote about how bad spelling can be dangerous like the serif of Alibi cursed by a badly educated deity and for days everything he touched turned to glod. A smolt of glod. Yes and these days the people of Alibi are renowned for being unusually short and bad tempered. Bear Mountain is in the larger area of the ram tops of course. Yeah there's a lovely description uh as they're flying away from the ram tops. Um the tiny kingdom of Lanka occupied little more than a wide ledge cut into the side

of the ram top mountains. Behind it knife edge peaks and dark winding valleys climbed into the massive backbone of the central vat ranges and in front the land dropped abruptly to the stow plains a blue haze of woodlands a broader expanse of ocean and somewhere in the middle of it all brown smudge known as Ankh-Morpork. So this is one of the first bits of sort of I think bigger world building that we get. Yeah yeah. There's some depiction of some of the shape of the world obviously early in like color of magic and when they're traveling uh which we were following along with the map for a bit but I don't currently have anywhere to hang the map up in my flat. Now I did think about bringing the map out and trying to trace the witches journey I might do

so next week. Yeah I might do for our final episode but it's quite nice here to hear a sort of description of where the mountains are in relation to the plains and then to the city itself. Yeah so I thought that was lovely whereas uh we've got the mine which is fun because we're getting again more insight into dwarf culture. Yeah uh but also the interesting thing about what's happening with dwarfs and good old fashioned dwarfs most dwarfs were off earning big money in the cities down in the lowlands where it's much easier to be a dwarf because you don't have to spend most of your time underground hitting your hand with thumb with a hammer and this is the first I think mention we'll see of something that becomes a fun theme which is more and more dwarfs

leaving the dwarf mines and underground cities and coming to the surface cities. Yeah yeah because we kind of covered it with trolls. Yeah we've had trolls especially in moving pictures and their word dwarfs around as well. Yeah but yeah it's it's becoming an emerging trend for dwarfs and trolls. Yeah and trolls are mentioned in that same thing as well you know trolls should stop wearing suits and walking upright and go back to living under bridges and jumping out and eating people. Well absolutely. So there's also many of the more traditional dwarf tribes have no female pronouns and the courtship of dwarfs is therefore very tactful. Yeah and that's uh something we'll come back to again. And we've come back to before. Yes this is this is one of the big things

about dwarfs. There's also the fact that every mine has its own king. Yes the boss is head into near. Yes uh there's a nice bit about um dwarfs having 200 words for rock that it's often said eskimos have 50 word for snow. And I just like the footnote of not often but not all the time but probably some people say hey those eskimos what are people 50 words for snow. And much like dwarfs eskimos don't have 50 words in you it's I suppose it's a more accurate term. These days of course. In you it is the much more accurate term and no there aren't 50 words for snow in the language there just are a lot of words for lots of different kinds of snow. Yes which makes sense like we've got lots of different types of words for rain meaning yes because we we need it god god damn we

need it. It's not raining right now. I've got the curtain closed I don't know for audio reasons you understand. Yes um and yes so dwarfs don't have a word for rock they have lots of different words for lots of different types of rock because that's the most thing for them. Good and god sorry that was an awful sentence. That is the most thing for them Diana and another thing which is not rock but quite a lot like rock is dwarf bread. Yes we're introduced to dwarf bread in the sections. Culinary tonight. I'm assuming it's kind of a piss taken of like lemba spread. Yeah you know you said that last time but I um accidentally when I was looking in the hobbit which was the wrong place to find invisible rooms but that's where I was looking um there's something

called cram which is like a crappy version of lemba spread which I think is what it is because the dwarfs were eating it in the hobbit um however I've said that and I now realise it was made by the men of Dale and shared with the dwarfs but it's like it's got similar properties to lembas except it's like they go on about how much it sticks in their throat. Yeah so dwarf bread seems to sustain people mostly by the fact that they just are willing to do anything other than eat dwarf bread which is fair. Yeah I don't think we it none of it gets eaten does it no it just gets traded with the dwarfs in the end yeah. And trod on and sat on and dunked in a river which the dwarfs eventually will be quite happy about. So then we've also got the the vampirish town

d'flabbergast. That's not what it's called though is it? No there's a sign no I think the castle that the town is beneath. Because there's some bats fly past the moon and then nanny says d'flabbergast. Oh I thought that was meant to be the name of the castle I must have written that down wrong. Because she wouldn't know what the name of the castle was would she? Wait if it had a sign. Did it have a sign? No I think I uh I confused myself there. Either way d'flabbergast does not actually mean bat uh that's a pity. Oh it doesn't. No no of course it wouldn't. D'flade a mouse. Ah well close. Which is also the name of a Strauss oparet. What does that mean just flying mouse? Yeah I'm assuming so. Yeah good afternoon. Yeah I kind of um thought it was a proto-Uberworld kind

of thing um so it's a Transylvania. Yeah yeah. What's it called when it's a place that's meant to be like a mirror of the place? It's not an allegory obviously it's a. Landogory. Yeah yeah why not. But yeah so while I was looking at that I noticed that because it talked about the Sylvainian gloom I was like Sylvainian I guess that means would it then? Yeah. I looked it up and yeah apparently Transylvania just meant like across the forest. Oh. Or on the other side of the forest and while I was finding that out it used to have a much cooler name because in medieval Latin it was called Ultrasylvania which meant beyond the woods so. Ultrasylvania is a really badass name. When we have a forest kingdom we can call it Ultrasylvania. Yeah and then Uberworld of course which we'll see

later there's another play on that but we can do that one together. Yeah but this is definitely sort of proto for a land we will get to later on. Yeah. And then obviously the big one that we start seeing is Genua which is interesting so Genua is a weird thing where it's like New Orleans with a magical fantasy kingdom dumped on top. Yeah because Pratchett said it was New Orleans was like Disneyland. Yeah I uh there's a good quote from him I got from the annotator Pratchett it had its genesis some years ago when I drove from Orlando to New Orleans and formed some opinions about both places in one you go there and fun is manufactured and presented to you in the other you just eat and drink and a lot of fun happens. Yeah that's nice.

So it is this sort of weird like Disneyland dumped on New Orleans situation. Yeah I didn't see the Disneyland but until I until I found that quote I was imagining one of the old European city states like uh like Venice for instance because it was going on about the quarrelling. Oh yeah factions within it but I'm sure there was inspiration drawn from a lot of places but I do like where he got it from it turns out that does work very well doesn't it. Especially fun never works. No structured fun is the organised fun is the devil. Mandatory fun excellent album. Yes excellent album terrifying concept so are we we are onto little bits that we liked. We are what do we like Joanna? There's everything about this book it's great yeah but uh one of the things

I really like is just the really quick humor of some bits and I think this comes partly from the fact that we're into like as we said before rim to mid-period disc world and it's really established and specifically with the witches like all the relationships have been established in a previous book so you can just be into it now. Yeah. Which allows for just great little exchanges you can tell it's just having fun with the double triple act of it all. Yeah this is like the real laugh out loud all the way through books possibly the first one. Yeah this is one of the ones that just consistently makes me giggle some of my favourites involving Magret garlic standing there bifurcated just as long as she got the young man's name and address. Is it bifurcated or

bifurcated? Probably bifurcated look I think Phil our listeners have accepted at this point that I will not say things correctly. But anyway yes ever since I read that a couple weeks ago every time I've seen myself in the mirror on trials I've been like standing there bifurcated because I love that very much. There's also a follow-up line to that which is that silly that's like saying everyone's naked under their clothes. Magret says Magret may you be forgiven and then Granny says well I'm not I've got three vests on. I'm a bit about like the wash parts of myself as and when they become available. Yeah I just wash the bits as and when they become available which is such a granny thing.

And then later on when Danny's like don't talk to me about hygiene when there's indoor toilets in somewhere they stay. He's probably old-fashioned country old women who know hygiene very well but it's just a little different from us. I mean yeah I also just really fucking love old women this is why so much white right is basically written for older women. Yeah there's so much room for comedy. Yeah it's definitely this kind of thing has brought me around to the inevitability of aging slightly more. I can't wait to be one of these old I can't wait to be nanny-og which is going to be nanny-og without the clan when I grow up. You make your own clan of little minions. Oh yes absolutely. And then there's lots of fun little references this is

something we'll come back to in each section. It gets heavier in the next few books but there's lots of Lord of the Rings bits in this. Yeah this third especially you've got the which were your favourite ones. Well you've got the invisible runes on the door of door. That was Lord of the Rings wasn't it because I tried to find one in the hobbit and there's some invisible keyhole in the hobbit but. No it's in Fellowship of the Ring when they enter the minds of Moria and they're stuck outside and can't work out what to do. Gandalf reveals the invisible rooms over the door and it says speak friend and enter. That's it or open up a few little sods. Yeah it's basically a synonym. It's dialectical. And the just-hold discussion of well

how do you know you've got proper invisible runes where you can't see them. Oh yeah. And then what was the other one oh yeah this is they're in the boat and they're going down the river and two pale glows appeared at the end of the lamplight and eventually they turned out to be the eyes of a small grey creature vaguely frog-like paddling towards them and it pulls up to the side of the boat and says hello it's my birthday and then Granny just takes it and goes down the side. That's obviously meant to be Smeagol on his birthday. Yeah it's I love how like complete and obvious that reference is and like it's a it's a big deal what it's referencing and that is just like smack with an aw. Can't trust the swimy ones. Basically if that had happened in Lord of the Rings

it would have been a much shorter book. Yeah no and some would argue that the Lord of the Rings could stand to be a slightly shorter book. Well it was a hobbit wasn't it that we had that scene but it's my birthday. Oh wait. That's when Bilbo gets his ring. Oh yeah of course. Yes. Sorry I'm thinking of Lord of the Rings and the film that have the flashback to when Smeagol finds the ring for the first time. Ah yes. Because it's on his birthday. Yes. Oh oh now I'm sad. Yeah I want to watch Lord of the Rings again. I don't I want to reread the hobbit and then get sad about that. I'm just getting sad about things at the moment though. This morning I cried at Black Tie by Gate Great. Grace Petrie. Oh that's what makes me cry like every time I listen to it. Oh okay good

not just me. Yeah that's absolutely a tear filled song. I'm going to start making a list of random shit that's making me cry so I can properly communicate like my slight worry of becoming a more emotional being. I cried at a spoon for like a straight 10 minutes yesterday so. All right cool cool I'm fine then. Yeah. If I'm using you as my benchmark which I'm sure is fine. Oh and then I put orange blossom water in my genitonic and cried for five minutes over that again. Did you okay? Yeah no I'm fine. It's just that it's a pandemic. I haven't seen another. I haven't been indoors with another human being in three weeks. Yeah yeah we'll go see each other outdoors again. Anyway so. What hasn't made me cry is folk songs. Yep. I mean they are somewhat eye watering.

So blue birds and such I'm assuming you're on about. Yes well there's a there's a lovely dedication at the beginning of this book actually dedicated to all those people who after the publication of Weird Sisters deluge the author with their versions of the Hedgehog song. Yes you can tell he's slightly baffled by it and why not. We won't be singing that on the podcast again. We will not. Although in future I may bust out my ukulele for future songs given to us by Nanny because she is a gift. A gift that keeps on giving in very unsuitable ways. She is actually a delight not a delight in the way I describe myself. A delight. But I just love Granny's dislike of them because you know you think you're listening to a nice song about cuckoos and nightingales and

yeah it sounds like she's referencing a particular one. Did you look into that? I had a quick look at the annotated Pratchett and there's quite a few different silly folks on this that sort of referenced. There's lots of traditional ones that involve walking out on a May morning and spying a maiden. Udallali etc. I did that to my Disney playlist recently. Excellent choice. I haven't watched that in forever. Now yeah that would be a good rewatch because it's been very very many years and that was possibly my first confusing cartoon crush. For context for any listeners you don't know what we're talking about. We mean the animator at Robin Hood where we were weirdly attracted to a cartoon fox. If you didn't get that from the three hummed notes we did there I had to

help you frankly. Sorry. I think a lot of people had confusing crushes on that cartoon fox. Yes yeah yeah. Anyway sorry what about garlic? Garlic Joanna. Yeah the one of the little bits I liked was the fact that this vampire ridden town heard by necessity started a very garlic heavy culinary tradition and although they were thoroughly sick of it by the time they were able to get rid of it I wondered if you had any recommendations of insanely garlic heavy meals because you know I rather like an inappropriate amount of garlic. Although I do not I would like to make this clear eat garlic sausage in bed. I am not going to. Boots on or off fine but no sausages. So I live above a Polish grocer that sells very very good garlic sausage

so I am not going to say that I've never eaten garlic sausage in bed. I think for research purposes you might have to deliberately eat some garlic sausage in bed before next week. Okay do I have to fix that? I'm going to have to film this for the listeners aren't I? Um sure. We'll have a podcast only fans why not. I've got to figure out the least sexy way possible to film myself eating sausage in bed. I'm not sure there's a sexy way to do what we're planning to do. That could be said about so many of our subscribers. How do we get here? Garlic recommendations please Joanna. So I um the restaurant I work in we get like huge kilo bags of pre-filled garlic because we get through so much of it which meant I took loads

home when we had to so I had to do some using up lots so I really like roasting garlic either peel clothes or whole bulbs and then just cutting off and squeezing out the puree and mixing that with butter and keeping that in the freezer so I've always got some roasted garlic butter. That's a good idea. Yeah also I made doom which is doom is the Arabic word for garlic but it's also the name for a particular garlic sauce. D-H-U-M or? T-O-U-M. Okay um and it is amazing so you just blitz loads of garlic with lemon juice and salt and then add oil really slowly and it comes up with like a mint like a it's like aioli but without the yeah it's gonna yeah. Oh it emulsifies and becomes this like mayonnaise like texture but that tastes like

kebab shop garlic sauce basically and it's completely vegan because you're adding eggs to it. Um what kind of food processor thingy? Is it a blender? Yeah I just have like a tiny little blender thing you just need something you can pour in the oil as you go you can even do it by hand if you really really finely mince the garlic with salt whisk it with lemon and then add the oil slowly while whisking it's just that hurts like fuck on your wrist. Yeah I've got a little electric whisk as well. Yeah okay cool. Uh so it's a it's a lengthy process because it has to really break down to emulsify but okay the sauce is amazing and because it's vegan and it's just garlic suspended in oil it lasts ages. Talking to you does get me over my cooking fatigue temporarily.

I get very excited about this so yeah so those are some of my favorite uber-garlicy things and uh yeah I'll get some garlic sausage to eat in bed. Thank you very much that little bit I liked was mainly just an excuse to ask for recipes so thank you. The second bit I liked was not an excuse to ask you for advice because it's about jump-starting a car. Which I have never had to do because I don't know. I haven't had to yet but I'm terrified of what I do because I don't really know how but um so Granny's broom almost could have been a character and I nearly suggested it until I noticed how many characters we already had. Yeah no it was originally I cut it out for for whatever you say but um because I remembered it was borrowed originally wasn't it so it was from

it was Hilters. Yes. Breamstick and Equal Rights so I think two bucks later we can assume she's not giving it back. Yeah. But I magrat like running up and down trying to start it and get it neutral and everything you can tell like it comes from practice experience with old cars because he's got like a mechanical background anyway and I expect he has done this with lots of different things they called it what did they call it um hump-starting in the books but obviously bump starting is when you push a vehicle downhill and like you have to engage the clutch like right at the right speed and then it starts the engine. I think generally these days you do it if everything else has failed but I imagine with older cars that would break down quite a lot that has happened

quite a lot. Yeah because you think of some like old-fashioned movies TV shows whatever you get people pushing cars along quite a lot don't you? Yeah it happens in the opening to Karate Kid which I watched for the first time recently uh yeah and I just love the mental image of not just Margaret doing it but Margaret trying to explain to this town full of very friendly very happy people who don't speak a word of English. And realising how stupid she sounded. Yeah which is the thing do you just sort of do it or do you speak while you're doing it so even though they don't understand your explanation they know you're you are explaining it. I feel like I'm like Margaret and I will try and over explain and just make it weirder. Yeah I don't like how much myself I see in Margaret.

Yeah Ditto I feel like I'm less comfortable read. I'm less Margaret now than I used to be but I definitely have Margaret like tendencies. Definitely later in the book where we get some like fantastic theories and quotes and things like I'm happy to say I'm definitely more like the other two than I am like Margaret these days but just when it comes to the general awkwardness yeah. I'm a social Margaret. I only Margaret socially. Social Margaret philosophical granny sexual nanny. Not me. Yeah I would say I'm like two-thirds nanny with a bit of Margaret and I would like to be quite granny where the work spot honestly I'm just never going to be that level of confident.

So speaking of witches onto the bigger stuff the actual nature of witchcraft and how it all works. All right back down this bit of a jump. Now we've got the rum started. There's a few different bits about it I like but what I find interesting is near the beginning when they're having the Sabbath. Oh yeah. And they're discussing the fact that these witches have boundaries and territories and areas they work for and this is this very slave and well building. This is the first time I think that that that is how the witches operate. This is the first time that's mentioned. That's a really good point because when I read that bit I was only thinking about the the fact that it was making the same reference about men writing things about

women dancing naked. Yeah I know I completely missed that. Yeah this is the first bit of and this is an interesting yeah we actually see witchy admin and I quite like that. Yeah and the fact that there's a the conflict of dominant personalities in a group of witches because they're all used to being in charge. It's yeah it's like tigers or something isn't it? With these massive territories and obviously it just would not naturally get along very well together. Yeah but they are intelligent enough to do a bit of admin. Yeah but I just like that you know they have got some kind of organizational system with people having different areas because it's something that's sort of alluded to with the fact that Granny lives where she does and

Nanny lives down into the town and Magret has another cottage further off that she inherited from Goody Wemper. Yeah yeah and they might have said something like her patch or something in the last one but yeah he's actually gone oh actually let's lay this out because this is quite fun. So yeah I like that we're getting this sort of this is the joy of doing a series that is this long like except we're on book 12 is that you get the really slow burn world building. Yeah and although it is kind of an admin thing it's it's a really good plot device isn't it because in this one like it's relevant because Magret takes over that Desiderata's job. Thank you Desiderata's job yeah and then in other books it becomes relevant again and yeah. Yeah so it's a lovely thing

and then some of the other stuff about just the nature of witchcraft there's a very good line about not using magic when the witches are left alone to deal with this mind collapse and Nanny says if the creator of Mentors to shift rocks by witchcraft he wouldn't have invented shovels knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Yes and this is that the magic of not doing. Although in this case shovels would not do the job. No and this is why pumpkins end up happening I also just quite like this doorway put down that Will Barrow Magret you don't know anything about machinery. Yeah slow fucking patronising. Magret's frustration with their attitude as well. There's a few pages later and she you know Magret it does get frustrated

at the way the witches speak to her understandably. Yeah and she's thinking about the fact that it doesn't seem like they bother they're not committed to witchcraft in the same way she is because this is Magret of the occult symbols and the mystical knives but she's still sensible enough you know we have the end of Whids sister she shoves the bread knife in her boot because she really she does know. Yeah but Magret knows she's very good at herbs and can double distill and do all these wonderful things whereas Nanny just gives people a hot poultice and Granny just gives them some colour liquid and Magret is so frustrated because that works. Yeah and she has put all of this effort into it so to see that actually it works in a much simpler way. It's almost like any profession

or any craft where you do have to put a lot more effort in at the start and you see that taking writing for instance you get people who try and write like Hemingway from the beginning and they almost always sound like shit because Ernest Hemingway could write like that because he knew how to write and then he worked out how to hone it down. Exactly. So I'm getting like yeah Nanny and Granny had to learn all the basics as well and perhaps they weren't as like airy fairy as Magret about it but I'm sure they worked until they whittled it down to the equivalent of one or two lines. Exactly and it's a bit like you get out with cooking as well when you start out you learn very much the proper way to do things which is often the French way and so I learned

especially like with the head chef I've got now we quite often do things in a much simpler way and it's like yes it is not the proper correct and traditional way but it takes half the time and you can't tell the fucking difference. Yeah so in that sense it is the correct way. And you know what the what the outcome should be and so you therefore can approach it from different directions. Yes and this is the thing Granny and Nanny know what the outcome should be and they know what they're doing works whereas Magret is still at the stage of learning all of it. And you can sympathise from both ends because you can see why Granny and Nanny are kind of a bit dismissive because they've got other things to be thinking

about and high-minded and you've got this let's be honest bit of a wet hand following alongside but then obviously they are being dicks. They are being dicks and then from Magret's point of view it's like why do I have to put so much work in if they're getting results the same way they're not doing it properly. Yeah and that can be very frustrating to watch. You can yeah yeah. I like that. As we reflect on that should we uh good good second mirrors. Good well then I was trying to think of something. You got that yeah mirrors. Do you know what I was saying last night I'm trying to learn about something scientific about this about power of mirrors and because like in the science of discworld it referenced something called interferometry which like includes mirrors

used in telescopes and things so I'm I'm going to get back to that hopefully I'll have something coherent before the end of the book because as as previously mentioned struggle a little bit with physics. So in the meantime um do you remember the first time you saw yourself like in infinity mirrors and that kind of I don't remember the first time. Do you remember playing with it as a kid. I do I remember I have a very specific memory of the guest room at my grandmother's house up north had this big antique dresser with a huge mirror on it and then there was a really ornate hand mirror and I would sit for hours and play with the hand mirror reflecting on the big antique mirror on the edge of the bed because it was up north and I was bored. Everyone I've asked has a

really specific memory like that so uh Jack remembered if he opened the bedroom bathroom cabinet and like the house he lived in before he was ten um he could do that and I remember going to my grandma's friend's house and always sitting at her vanity and arranging it so I could do that like so readers no the other ones listeners please write in and tell us yours um because my current sample size is very small. Yeah if you could all tell us your early memories of seeing yourself between two mirrors that would be great. Yeah um but yeah the other mirror stuff that comes up um I just noticed on page 30 granny as she looks at the covered mirror in Desi Dorata's Des Dorata's living room cottage yeah she makes a comment about not knowing that Des Dorata was frightened of

thunderstorms um so I looked into that and it seems to be a fairly widespread but pretty old fashions as in it's dying out a little bit belief uh the mirrors attract thunderstorms to our house oh right so if it was raining or if like a storm might be coming you'd cover or even take down the mirrors um so I found references from a lot of South America I've ever Brazil and El Salvador and then also which might be relevant I'm not sure it's also a belief in the uh creole culture a lot around Louisiana um and obviously because this ties in with New Orleans yeah however I also have a feeling although I can't find a primary source that it was also a belief in Europe yeah I can imagine that was probably an English folk belief yeah yeah so I think that might be a reference

to that um oh also you should also cover a mirror after death in the house apparently to avoid the spirit getting trapped in there so when Des Dorata hung up on Lilith that did have a dual purpose yeah that's my that's my mirror things for today there's so much more on mirrors in the next few books I did try when it um described Lilith's room and there's like an octagon of mirrors and then there's the like he describes it in detail so much that I feel like I should be able to build a simulation thing in one of these free programs and I ran out of time and it's difficult so I might send you a link and get you to do it for me I would quite like to have a look at that actually that could be quite fun yeah because it's a really cool description of like the octagon

of mirrors and open to the sky and yeah obviously there's just a shit ton of folklore surrounding mirrors so I fell down that rabbit hole fairly extensively yeah I would say not a folklore thing but something I've noticed that's been quite good for my mental health is I no longer have a mirror above my sink in my bathroom my bathroom has a pretty weird layout so it's on the opposite wall okay which means I've just very rarely look in my bathroom mirror because I don't have any cause to be looking at that bit so you choose to look at it yeah if you want to yeah not being confronted with my own face first thing in the morning is really quite good yeah yeah I can see that I've been thinking about taking mine down because um just because like I'm a skin picker

then if I give myself a chance and it's right there then yeah it's more likely to happen so yeah yeah I could just move it it's not that I dislike my face or anything it's just that I don't necessarily want to acknowledge my own existence first thing no well yeah I don't feel particularly benevolent towards anything first thing so it's unlikely my face is going to be the exception exactly uh so ties us back into a rarely discussion of how it feels to wake up in the morning although actually my hair is at that length now where it doesn't look too bad in the morning which is nice my head there's a last maybe another week my hair is at that length where it looks the way it looks yes anytime which is good I like it I like it there's a lot of it uh so power stories power stories

I don't have a segue for that no this is the big thing and I'm going to talk about this in every section of the book because I love it and this is why I love this book so much the whole thing that I bring up almost every book this narrative causality idea yes and this is the book where he gets to play with it yeah he's the whole thing yeah it's like he's been generating those building blocks for himself in the last 11 books and now he's like right I'm going to play in the sampe that's a mix the mess falls up yeah stories great flapping ribbons of shaped space time have been blowing and uncoiling around the universe since the beginning of time and their very existence overlays a faint but insistent pattern on the chaos that is history stories etched grooves deep

enough for people to follow in the same way that water follows certain paths down a mountainside and it sort of says you know once a story is started it takes shape and it picks up all the vibrations of that story so history repeats a thousand heroes are stolen fire from the gods and thousand walls to be some grandmother and there's a footnote on urban myths as well isn't there yes which I had to look up because I actually don't know a lot of common urban myths in there dead grandmother's whisked away on the reef racks have stolen cars yeah which is an urban myth about people whose grandmother dies on a journey so they tie to the reef rack and then the car gets stolen oh lawyer lousations choking on the fingers of midnight burglars which is the thing people

go out and they come home and their dog's choking and it's fingers so it's a burglar his hand they've been off um yeah those are the two main ones at reference references oh the last one my brood husband will be livid it was his travel module and this is sort of a thing about yeah two people having sex in the car and having to get assistance to be taken out of it because the lock stuck or something and then the woman saying oh my husband will be livid it was his car oh you're wrong about has a really good episode on urban myths which I will recommend oh cool yeah so urban myths I kind of don't I feel like I've skipped over the wrong part of uh time like I feel like urban myths have fallen by the wayside in place of like things like creepypasta for us hmm yeah yeah uh I haven't lived

in the bit of the world where there was a lack of internet and check to see how many times this story has been told yeah yeah like we've probably heard a few urban myths in the pubs before smartphones for a thing but yeah you're right it's less of a thing now yeah if someone comes up to one of us and said oh you never hear what never guess what happened over stone market where it would be like no shit bring out the phone like try and find the news article yeah man door hook car hand yeah so yeah but yeah the less specific ones obviously are the the general structures of stories exactly and the the fairytale-ness of this it really fascinates me I'm really obsessed with fairytales and stories and why we tell the stories we tell so much why we tell of the the happily ever afters

and the handsome prince rescuing us and then obviously ever in a lot about it and about the side characters of these stories and uh so one of my favorite things I've ever written is the monologue the crone yeah which I kind of regret not organizing a radio play version of for this but we will do it for a later book yes I haven't actually spoken to the actor about it but she listens to this so hi Helen I'm going to need you thanks this is how they're doing all of my communications from now if you don't listen to the podcast it's entirely all false if you don't burn up for the meetings but yeah this idea of the maiden the mother and the other one yeah yeah and that was fun because I was writing about what it is to be the other one and to have had to live

through all these stories and live through this entire cycle yeah and how women become treated very differently as the stories move on whereas men basically get to go from prince to king yeah and then I know die eventually yeah whereas women quite often become villains as they get older yeah I just like the inescapable nature of stories the fact that you will find yourself falling into it whether you like it or not and I like kind of looking for the weird narrative causality moments in my own life like we were joking um UI and another friend had gone for a of course socially distanced for our coffee outside and I was wearing a hat that kept blowing away and we said well if there was any narrative causality a handsome man with a dog would rescue

the hat for me and have to jump in a river yeah so very annoyed that hasn't happened but I do keep wearing fetching hats on windy days just in case and it's interesting they were all kind of subconsciously aware of the structure of stories even if we couldn't vocalize it's like when you watch a tv show and you know what's gonna happen next because of course that's what's gonna happen next and then occasionally you get the show where it doesn't and then it's captured by surprise and those are very good ones yeah but if you're watching it comfort watching like modern family something like that you're like and this is gonna happen and this is gonna happen and that's fine and that's an interesting thing whereas for so much of humanity these same stories were told over

and over again these same myths the myths of hubris that come from greek mythology and the myths of trust that come from norse mythology and then the myths of fairy tales that develop especially from the germanic influence and that becomes these dark horrible stories that then get disneyfied and prettified whereas I think now in a much more modern age the stories that we all know and that we all can spot happening over and over again are kind of those things like sitcom structures yeah and we know the hero's journey from movies and from tv series so where we see a story we see we spot this should be a romcom moment I should walk into someone with a cup of coffee or a handsome man with a dog should rescue my hat and I think it's quite fascinating to look at how narrative

causality changes in like a modern time yeah yes it's um it's probably that we get to watch or hear or read a lot more stories as well than you might have done a long time ago because we're not relying on one person's memory or very expensive books and we've got the television you know I'll sit here and binge watch 16 20 minute stories in a row yeah we've we've possibly got more of a sense of narrative causality than we would have done a few hundred years ago yeah but I think to circle it background to the book and specifically the fairy tale of it all you know they're immediately confused by by the fact that what they need to do is stop someone from marrying a prince because yes that's not what the story should be yes and of course it has to be three

of them even though Margaret thinks it should just be her because stories things come in threes yeah and there are all these little elements of the book itself setting you up for this is going to be a story and because it's a story about the nature of stories you really know it's going to be so meta and yeah it is very meta because then what you end up getting is a beautiful story that defines expectations of every turn but all of these expected stories happening within it like it's referencing the things it's not doing at the same time as then showing them yeah like the vampire being defeated yeah so and it's why I love the book it's why I think it's such a lovely book yeah yeah it is great in my memory it was just one of the funniest and it is

interesting to reread with a slightly different lens on do you have an obscure reference for me Francine yeah it's the end of the quote you were saying about the stories flapping about to put it far less beautifully oh those flapping stories it says it takes a special kind of person to fight back and become the bicarbonate of history so I was kind of imagining like you know when you put bicarbonate soda and vinegar together I was imagining like a violent reaction almost like yeah being the spanner in the works almost um but then I having looked into it slightly I think he's probably referencing bicarbonate as a neutralizer like um you know bicarbonate's like an electrolyte in your body yeah um which your kidneys give out and absorb and it maintains

blood pH so it kind of keeps things neutral mm-hmm and stops things from going to the extreme and I'm wondering if that's what it means like the bicarbonate of history is to be the calm the fuck down person yeah I like that I don't know it could be other way what do you think uh I think you've just reminded me I needed to put bicarbon my shopping list cool cool well listeners please please write in with your shopping lists and opinions send us your opinions send Tesco no send us your shopping lists send Tesco your opinions other supermarkets are available well Joanna I think that's a good place to wrap it up yes so next week we'll be back with part two of which is abroad I don't know when that's going to end yet we'll let you know when we know

I'll tweet it I always say that I never remember to tweet it anyway thank you very much for listening to the two shall make you fret if you enjoyed this podcast please rate us review and subscribe and things wherever you get your podcast because it helps other people find us please tell people about us I think the world needs to know uh we are slowly we're a few weeks away from recording our Christmas slash hogs watch special yeah so please if you have any letters for the hogfather I will cry and be a slightly better actor than last year I don't know what you're talking about that was all legit if you've got any letters for the hogfather if you've got any letters or questions for us anything you want to hear us talk about discworld or otherwise please

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