Instantly, idiot fishermen become nationalists – fathers complain of foreigners stealing ‘their squid, while their sons groan-inducingly express confusion over how the squid can belong to someone when they haven’t been caught yet.
Here, the island of Leshp rises out of the sea in a slightly Lovecraftian and strangely prophetic re-imagining of the 1831 appearance of Graham Island (prophetic as about five years after the book was written it was believed that Graham Island would return again, and it was promptly and pre-emptively claimed for all eternity as the territory of Sicily so far it’s still underwater, but flags and ownership notices have been lowered down onto it through the water). One gets the strong feeling that he simply does not understand The Other Side on some issues, and so assumes out of desparation that they must be deaf, or stupid, and in either case in need of some LOUD SLOOOOW LEKSHURING. Most of the time, Pterry is even-handed and nuanced but when there’s an Issue he has Opinions about, no legitimate opposition is admitted. Pratchett is incredibly patronising here.Now that said, I know exactly why I’ve always had a problem with it. So I’m moving past it, and may return to it at Christmas if I feel like it. I have skipped Hogfather, partly because I reviewed it already before starting this re-read project, and partly because I might just read it again at Christmas anyway, which isn’t long now. Perhaps you might be interested in the rest of my ongoing Complete Discworld Reread project?īut… but… but that was much better than I remember it being!
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