The Annotated Pratchett File, v9.0 - The L-Space Web

APF v9.0, August 2004
inspected the steaming blade. ‘Hmm,’ he said.
‘Interesting. . . ’ ”
Lord Hong finds the blade interesting because he has just
discovered a way to quench red-hot sword blades without
oxidising them.
I am told that traditional Japanese sword makers did
actually use condemned prisoners, but that was for
testing purposes only, not for the actual forging process.
Apparently, sword quality was sometimes measured in
terms of the number of bodies the sword could cut
through with a single blow.
– [ p. 221/177 ] “History told of a runner who’d run forty
miles after a battle to report its successful outcome to
those at home.”
After a successful naval battle at the town of Marathon in
Greece, a man reportedly ran all the way to Athens, 42
kilometres away, to inform his leader of the victory. He is
also reported to have died on the spot from the strain
after announcing their win. This is how the running event
of the same name was born.
– [ p. 230/184 ] “ ‘Why’re their feet so small’ said
Cohen.”
Foot binding was a very common practice in China among
women of the upper classes. As young girls, their feet
would be wrapped in painfully tight bandages. When the
girls grew, their feet did not. By adulthood the feet were
barely half their proper length, which was considered
attractive. Thankfully the procedure has almost died out.
– [ p. 236/189 ] “ ‘So there was only blue left. Well, he’d
show them. . . ’ [. . . ] He had to simplify it a bit, of course.”
Three Solid Frogs is inventing the Willow Pattern Plate,
the well-known blue oriental picture of a maiden standing
on a bridge.
– [ p. 291/233 ] “ ‘How lucky do you feel, my lords’ ”
Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry. See the annotation for
p. 136/124 of Guards! Guards!.
– [ p. 296/238 ] “A seven foot warrior smiled at him.”
In 1974, thousands of terracotta warriors (no two faces
alike!) were discovered around the tomb of Qin Shi
Huangdi at Mount Li, in the Shaanxi Province. Huangdi
was the first emperor of a unified China (221–207 BC),
famed for being harsh, autocratic, and intolerant of
criticism.
– [ p. 303/243 ] “ ‘Orrrrr! Itiyorshu! Yutimishu!’ ”
Terry writes:
“During WWII Hollywood obviously made a lot of gung-ho
war movies. But. . . who could play the Japanese The
Japanese in the US were banged up in holiday camps in
Death Valley or someplace. So the producers roped in
anyone who ‘looked Japanese’ — mainly Koreans, the
story runs. The actors didn’t really have lines since their
job was, basically, to be shot by John Wayne. In order to
give them something ‘Japanese sounding’ to say, some
genius suggested they shout, very fast, “I tie your shoe,
you tie my shoe”. . .
I’ve never dared check by watching the actual movies. . . ”
– [ p. 307/246 ] “It was a grainy picture, and it was in
shades of green rather than proper colours, [. . . ]”
Rincewind is wearing the Discworld equivalent of a
Virtual Reality helmet.
– [ p. 307/246 ] “[. . . ] a row of little pictures lit up on the
wide cuff. They showed soldiers. Soldiers digging,
soldiers fighting, soldiers climbing. . . ”
The icons for controlling the Red Clay Army are
immediately familiar to anyone who has ever played the
computer game Lemmings, in which you have to use
similar controls to guide a group of brainlessly wandering
lemmings across intricate and dangerous underground
labyrinths.
When this was first remarked upon by readers in a.f.p,
Terry wrote:
“What Lemmings Merely because the red army can
fight, dig, march and climb and is controlled by little
icons Can’t imagine how anyone thought that. . .
Not only did I wipe Lemmings from my hard disc, I
overwrote it so’s I couldn’t get it back.”
– [ p. 329/264 ] “ ‘Friendly stab’, as it is formally known.”
The Discworld version of our world’s military euphemistic
language, in which “friendly fire” stands for weaponry
accidentally fired at own troops, “permanent
pre-hostility” means ‘peace’, and “collateral damage”
refers to civilians killed.
– [ p. 350/281 ] “[. . . ] a calendar for the year surmounted
by a rather angular picture of a beagle, standing on its
hind legs.”
One of the classic computer programs that circulated in
the seventies used ASCII characters to ‘draw’ a picture of
Snoopy from Peanuts, followed by the year’s calendar.
– [ p. 351/282 ] “The old blokes say that sort of thing used
to happen all the time, back in the Dream.”
For an explanation of where exactly Rincewind has
landed see the annotation for p. 149/132 of Reaper Man
(just in case the significance of the word “kangaroo”
escaped your attention).
The Dream is a reference to the Aboriginal Dreamtime
religion.
Maskerade
– Maskerade, as a parody of The Phantom of the Opera, is
based largely upon the musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber,
but makes the events and characters more realistic.
Hence, in Phantom, Christine is the beautiful, slim, new
star, with a good voice that needs training, holding back
and reluctant to take her rightful place in the opera.
Carlotta is the jealous prima donna, with a classical voice
on the verge of decreptitude, and large lungs. The
Phantom wants Christine to sing, and the owners would
be happy to oblige, but for the need to keep Carlotta’s
ego assuaged.
MASKERADE 89