HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: ginsu@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Wes Simonds)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Blues Brothers
Date: 12 Nov 92 10:36:00 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

Nice to see that there is SOME US comedy that's getting international 
attention.  Not that most of it deserves any... I would say, however,
that When Harry Met Sally, Arthur (IF it was written by an American, which
I don't know), and the later Diane episodes of Cheers measure up to the
splendid Brit standard.  Some of the early Seinfelds and M*A*S*Hs also.

Any other US stuff that has some popularity in England?  Or anywhere besides
the US?
Organisation: European Space Technology Centre (E.S.T.E.C)
Date: Wednesday, 11 Nov 1992 20:11:22 CET
From: <NSTEVEN@ESTEC.BITNET>
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject:    Getting DW Books In Italy

I've now managed to overcome my usual illiteracy and gotten around to reading t
he 1st 3 books in the DW series. Now that I'm in Rome, it's not too easy gettin
g the next books. I've tried all the English Language bookshops (well there's o
nly 2) and you're lucky if you can get 'The Beano' in these places.

Anyone who can tell me how to obtain said works will be bought many beers shoul
d they find me in Rome (and there's some pretty good taverns out here too).

On-on! (Oh hang on, you're supposed to say that in alt.hash.house.harriers
aren't you!)

OK. Well, cheers then.

Nick. (Heavy Breather).
From: hs0sagg@sunlab1.bath.ac.uk (S A G Granville)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: UK signings
Date: 10 Nov 92 10:15:48 GMT
Organization: Bath University Computing Services, UK

>Witches Abroad/Lords and Ladies signings:
>
>A couple of extras to add to the main list posted last month:
>
>November 18, 1-2pm: Heffers Paperback Shop, 31 St Andrews St, Cambridge.  [I
>doubt this'll be a biggy, because I did one only a month or so ago on the
>OYCSM tour -- but they heard I was giving a talk at the Cambridge Union
>Society the night before and asked if they could set this up.]
>
>December 4, 12.30-1.30 Volume 1, the Queensmere Shopping Centre, Slough.  I
>don't know anything about this chain; this is a kind of test signing.
>
>Terry

CAn someone please post me the first list as have been logging on only
infrequently.

Thanks

Simon.
From: jwh@doc.ic.ac.uk (James William Handley)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Death in general
Date: 10 Nov 1992 11:08:42 -0000
Organization: Department of Computing, Imperial College, University of London, UK.
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: finch.doc.ic.ac.uk


Don't know if any have you have seen Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey, in which Bill &
Ted die, and play Death to get back to life...

In Reaper Man (??) Death talks about playing Monopoly, and in B&T they play a
whole variety of board games, and I was just wondering which came first, or if it
was just parallel evolution???

('tis a good film too, especially when they Melvin Death) ROTFL

			   TTFN,
			      James

PS That reminds me, in case anyone didn't know, ROTFL = Roll On The Floor Laughing
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: ep@donald.ktek.sintef.no (Elizabeth Passano)
Subject: Wolfman reference
Reply-To: ep@kobe.sintef.no (Elizabeth Passano)
Organization: Norwegian Institute of Technology 
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 92 16:05:49 GMT

From "The Annotated Pratchett File, v4.0, part 1 of 2"
posted Nov 5, 1992 by Leo Breebaart (leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl)

> + [p. 97] "Every full moon I turn into a wolfman. The rest of the time
>   I'm just a ... wolf."
>   There is a fantasy short story by a famous author [somehow Larry Niven
>   comes to mind. Anybody?] that has exactly the same idea for a punchline.


Ursula K. LeGuin has a short story on this theme, told from the point of
view of the (wolf)wife; "The Wife's Story" in the collection "The Compass Rose"
first published July 1988, Bantam paperback '83.

I like the earlier LeGuin (Earthsea, Orsini, etc.), but found this collection
and the later work that I have tried too depressing. Wellwritten stuff
about the futility of existence does tend to get me down...

Now, Terry Pratchett's work normally leaves me with a sense of great 
amusement about the world. Espesially the first and last of the nome books.


Elizabeth Passano
From: sauron@archimedes.WPI.EDU (Amy Rich)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Actors for DW Film (was Re: new topic)
Date: 9 Nov 1992 14:12:42 GMT
Organization: Worcester Polytechnic Institute
NNTP-Posting-Host: archimedes.wpi.edu

In article <ins534z.721271806@aurora.cc.monash.edu.au> ins534z@aurora.cc.monash.edu.au (Quetzal) writes:
>ano@csug.cs.reading.ac.uk (Adrian Ogden) writes:
>>> The Patrician: Patrick Stewart
>
>>Hmmm, Jean-Luc Vetinari... has anyone seen him in anything other
>>than ST:TNG?

ive actually seen him in a video version of _Oedipus Rex_
(very interesting, it was)



   +---------------------+---------\\__--.------------------------+
   |      Amy Rich       |      |\/   o\ . ARGGH.... Stop eating  |
   +---------------------+      |   "" <.                         |
   | sauron@wpi.wpi.edu  |      |/\  __/       my .sig file...    |
   +---------------------+---------//-----------------------------+
From: ano@csug.cs.reading.ac.uk (Adrian Ogden)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Douglas vs Terry (etc. etc....)
Date: 6 Nov 92 10:15:01 GMT
Organization: University of Reading

andyh@syma.sussex.ac.uk (Andrew Holyer) writes:

>In article <1992Nov5.104424.1@vax1.tcd.ie> eaobrien@vax1.tcd.ie writes:
>>
>>  Now, if we could find a Robert Rankin fan..

>Folks, I know they're really nothing like the  discworld, (not better,
>not  worse, dist...  different),  but what do   people think about the
>"Myth" books? Aspirin's got a totally different  style,  but I do have
>the feeling that they're somehow worthy of note.

Only read the first one, which I'd describe as 'OK'. They are indeed
nothing like the Discworld; I think while Pratchett's style of humor is
in a similar vein to Adams (no flames please, this is a _very loose_
analogy!), Aspirin's runs closer to Harry Harrison's "Stainless Steel
Rat" series.

As for Robert Rankin, I've now got through 2/3 of both the "Armageddon"
and the "Brentford" books and I definitely recommend them. I can't think
of a single comparison 'though...


<<  Adrian Ogden -- "Sic Biscuitus Disintegrat" -- ano@csres.cs.rdg.ac.uk  >>

    'Jim Pooley drew out his lighter and struck fire. "You go rev up
     your morris", he said, "and I will toast the feet of my camel."
From: wass@sics.se (Anders Wass)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Of Kirby and monkeys (oops, I mean apes, apes AAaaaaaahh)
Date: 12 Nov 1992 07:02:52 GMT
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: meryl.csd.uu.se
Keywords: orangutans

Inspecting the cover of Lords and Ladies it's good to see
that Kirby has learned to draw a proper orangutan (not the
case on Sourcery). He really does seem to read the books more
carefully theese days, isn't he. I mean, on the first covers
he used more than a little of one of them, wossname, artistic
freedoms, didn't he.

Well, not a Ronald in sight...

wass
Date: Fri,  6 Nov 92 09:31:36 +0100
From: Benedikt_Heinen@firemark.fido.de (Benedikt Heinen)
Subject: Re: Pratchett vs. Adams: money
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
X-Comment-To: (Wes Simonds)
Organization: Firemark.BBS - 1st Atari ST Node Aachen 

 WS> It is a lamentable fact that publishers are driven largely by concerns of
 WS> capital, but it is indisputable that Adams earns them a far greater
 WS> return on  investment than Pratchett ever has.
But I don't think that this is the point for us Pratchett-*Fans*! When I take 
looks on the latest Adams-Books I can only see that Adams seems to write them 
*for the money he gets for it* rather than *for the fun writing*! When I heard 
that Pratchett would abandon the Discworld-cycle, because he doesn't get enough 
new ideas, I accepted it. Adams in fact wrote a fourth part to his 
"Hitchhiker"-trilogy. The most funny things about this book is that it is the 
fourth part of a trilogy. The only good book Adams wrote was the first 
"Hitchhiker".... The rest seems to be onyl written for the additional money!

The "fun-level" in Pratchetts' books is climbing from book to book, while 
Adams' ones is only dropping...

 WS> Applause for you, Mr. Pratchett; you have made many of us happier people
Right you are!!!

bye,

    Benedikt

Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: johnf@apollo.hp.com (John Francis)
Subject: Re: The Annotated Pratchett File, v4.0, part 1 of 2
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 21:47:47 GMT
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Corporation, Chelmsford, MA

In article <leo.721303993@galaxy> leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl writes:
>johnf@apollo.hp.com (John Francis) writes:
>>
>> Could we have "intended to sound Scandinavian (or Dutch - opinions differ)"?
>> 
>I base the annotation on the fact that it says *in the book itself*
>that Rjinswand is Swedish. Why would Terry come up with a Swedish
>character and then give him a name that was intended not to sound
>Scandinavian, but Dutch? Note that I don't doubt that to some
>'Rjinswand' actually does sound Dutch, but I see no reason to change
>the annotation unless some more hard evidence becomes available.

Why indeed?  THe question is, did Terry really come up with a Swedish character?
If you really want to split hairs, what it says in the book is something like

"Dr. Rjinswand, a bachelor, aged 33, born in Stockholm, raised in New Jersey .."
(I don't have the books in the office, so the wording may not be exactly right).

I am well aware of this.  I still contend, however, that even faced with this
sentence in isolation significant numbers of British readers will assert that
Dr. Rjinswand is Dutch, not Swedish.  As there is no hard evidence that Terry
did, indeed, intend Rjinswand to sound Swedish, and as opinions are divided
on this issue, I suggested compromise wording for the annotation.

You are, of course, free to include what annotations you want.
(As you succinctly put it: "its *my* APF so there").
But I'm sure you don't believe I'm a minority of one - as you yourself pointed
out the first time this subject was raised you got multiple mail messages which
claimed Rjinswand was a Dutch name.  That in itself should warrant inclusion
the four little words I suggested.  Consider how it looks from our perspective.

What would you do if you came across the wording in a Dutch novel:

        "Arthur Pettegrew, .. born in Lisbon, raised in Philadelphia, . . ."

Wouldn't you suspect that Arthur Pettegrew might be British?

Now how would you feel if I (being British myself), pointed out that there is
no way Arthur Pettegrew could be British because we don't spell it that way -
the correct spelling if he were British would be "Pettigrew".

-- 
John Francis                                 johnf@apollo.hp.com
with 9 cats to feed, I don't have time to think up a clever .sig
From: xtifr@netcom.com (Chris Waters)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: The Annotated Pratchett File, v4.0, part 1 of 2
Date: 6 Nov 92 18:57:56 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest)

>THE COLOUR OF MAGIC

The section entitled, "The Lure of the Wyrm," bears more than a passing
resemblance to the world created by the popular writer, Anne McAffrey in
her _Dragon<xxx>_ books (Dragonflight, etc.).  The character "Liessa" is
obviously based on McAffrey's character "Lessa", and other dragonriders
have names with exclamation points in them, e.g. "Lio!rt", while most of
McAffrey's dragonriders have names with apostrophes in them, e.g. "F'lar".
-- 
Chris Waters    | the insane don't | "Don't you boys know NICE songs?"
xtifr@netcom.COM| need disclaimers |                 -- Joe's mama
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl (Leo Breebaart)
Subject: Re: The Annotated Pratchett File, v4.0, part 1 of 2
Reply-To: leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl
Organization: Delft University of Technology
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1992 12:04:36 GMT

johnf@apollo.hp.com (John Francis) writes:

> "Dr. Rjinswand, a bachelor, aged 33, born in Stockholm, raised in
> New Jersey .."  (I don't have the books in the office, so the
> wording may not be exactly right).
> 
> I am well aware of this.  I still contend, however, that even faced
> with this sentence in isolation significant numbers of British
> readers will assert that Dr. Rjinswand is Dutch, not Swedish. 

Ok, I give up. It's the age-old discussion about author's intent vs.
reader's interpretation all over again, of course.

I still feel that you have no case for saying that Terry's *intent*
was to make the name sound Dutch. And we'll never find out unless we
ask him.

But you are right in saying that an apparantly rather common
*interpretation* is that it sounds Dutch, and that this interpretation
might as well be mentioned in the APF.

> You are, of course, free to include what annotations you want.  (As
> you succinctly put it: "its *my* APF so there").  

Just for the record: I had already changed the entry as per your
suggestion after your first article on the subject. It's just that I'm
always game for a little spirited discussion, especially on trivial,
unresolveable Matters of Interpretation.



-- 
Leo Breebaart  (leo @ ph.tn.tudelft.nl)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: dkf11@cl.cam.ac.uk (Donal K. Fellows)
Subject: Kirby (was Re: Film(s) of the Book(s))
Reply-To: dkf11@phx.cam.ac.uk (Donal K. Fellows)
Organization: U of Cambridge Comp Lab, UK
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 00:01:27 GMT

In article <721571035.9894@minster.york.ac.uk> car-a@minster.york.ac.uk writes:
>Does Josh Kirby have any books of artwork out?
> 

Yes. I have seen them, but my budget is too low for me to get them.

It was a while ago, so I can't remember what the book was called, but it looked
interesting.

Donal.
--
"Everything that is not nailed down is mine.
 Everything that I can pry loose is not nailed down."
    - Collis P. Huntingdon
Date: Mon,  9 Nov 92 01:23:52 +0100
From: Benedikt_Heinen@firemark.fido.de (Benedikt Heinen)
Subject: Re: DW Film... (was Re: Guards! Guards! play
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
X-Comment-To: (Tpratchett)
Organization: Firemark.BBS - 1st Atari ST Node Aachen 

 t> The Americans said: sure, we LOVE it, it's GREAT, it's HIGH CONCEPT.  Just
 t> lose the Death angle, guys.
Hey, jolly good... Mort without the DEATH-character... Let me guess, without 
DEATH we should be able to compress the whole book "Mort" into a few pages, eh? 
;(

 t> Currently, since the amount of money available for making movies in Europe
 t> is about sixpence, the consortium is looking for some more intelligent
 t> Americans in the film business.  This may prove difficult.
Ever thought about TriBeCa? They want to make "more intelligent" films... (Just 
think of their first production "Mistress" - noone in the U.S. wanted it, so it 
was published in Europe later...) :) But I don't know, whether they're so fond 
of Fantasy movies...
Perhabs they could do the "Good Omens" movie?

bye,

   Benedikt

Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: Nathan.Torkington@vuw.ac.nz
Subject: Casting
Organization: Contract to CSC, Victoria Uni, Wellington, New Zealand
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 06:28:54 GMT
Distribution: alt

It is interesting to see the large numbers of posts by movie-going
trendoids in America that want to cast the stars of the latest
box-office media-hype megabuck earner as the relatively sane members
of the Discworld.  I mean, "Arnie as Carrot" has got to rate up there
with "I don't know why your TV doesn't go - have you tried licking the
mains cables" and "let's cast an ex-president as the sensitive
teenager in a movie adaptation of _The Secret Diaries of Adrian Mole_"
as the least thought-out suggestions ever.

I guess it all shows how varied our opinions are as to what the
population of the Discworld look like.  The merkins among us would
have it populated by the stars of the (American) silver screen,
whereas the colonial deep-thinkers have evisioned the Discworld as a
drawn-out "Alas Smith and Jones" saga.

I still stick by my opinion that the majority of the parts should be
cast to English actors, in order that the movie be funny (and not a
disastrous flop, a-la the majority of barfacious "humorous" movies
that are ejaculated from the shores of the Unties Spates and giggle,
guffaw and grunt their way through abominable scripts before being
wiped up by the tissue of public opinion).  However, I await the
further posts that will attempt to miscast burly patently unamusing
American actors as witty people with bated breath.

Yours in M-x flame mode :-)

Nat.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: "steve degroof" <steve.degroof@canrem.com>
Subject: more rantings from sd
Reply-To: "steve degroof" <steve.degroof@canrem.com>
Organization: Canada Remote Systems
Distribution: alt
Date: 8 Nov 92 16:38:00 EST

Me again,
Just wanted to put in my 1.61 cents worth...

> ... but what do   people think about the "Myth" books? Aspirin's
> got a totally different  style,  but I do have the feeling that
> they're somehow worthy of note.
You betcha! Robert Aspirin's books come third on my shopping list
(after TP and DNA). However, I haven't seen anything after "Myth
Inc. in Action" and "Phules Paradise". Such is the plight of the
Colonist (sigh). :)

> When the sun is directly overhead at Q, it is noon at P (and
> everywhere else on line L2).  Note that "morning" will only
> be equal in length to "evening" on the days of the Summer
> Solstices!
> ...this solution works only for the first chapter of TCOM,
> where the Rim has seasons, and does *not* work for anything else,
> where the Rim is tropical throughout the year.
For a tropical rim, try putting the sun in an oblique orbit. In
the extreme case, the sun's orbit would be parallel to the plane
of the rim, leaving the hub in darkness and the rim hotter than
Hell. Now, if you were to put the sun's orbit at an angle (relative
to the plane of the disc) of oh, say, 23 degrees, you'd probably
find that the hub would be quite frigid whereas the rim would have
a tropical climate. I didn't bother working this out on paper,
so don't torch me if it's wrong; but it sounds right. Maybe I'll
put together a computer simulation and play with the parameters
a bit. Anybody interested in the results?

>>> The Patrician: Patrick Stewart
>>Hmmm, Jean-Luc Vetinari... has anyone seen him in anything other
>>than ST:TNG?
>Yes - he was Gurney Halleck in David Lynch's _Dune_, and he was also
>Sejanus in the BBC's dramatisation of _I, Claudius_.
He was also in a rather strange SF movie called "Lifeforce", which
was apparently based on a novel called "Space Vampires".


 ************
*            *
*        *    *
 ****    *    *
     *   *    *
*    *       *
 ****   *****
--
Canada Remote Systems  - Toronto, Ontario
World's Largest PCBOARD System - 416-629-7000/629-7044
From: pete@minster.york.ac.uk
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: New topic?
Date: 5 Nov 92 14:54:53 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of York, England

eaobrien@vax1.tcd.ie wrote:
: A few more ideas..
: 
: Rowan Atkinson ... not really Rincewind, is he ? Now he would be perfect
: as Duke Felmet (Wyrd Sisters)..

Not a bad idea.
: 
: David Dixon (formerly Ford Prefect)..I think he could do Rincewind.

Nooo. Too self-assured by half. John Sparkes (Siadwel from Naked
Video; Denzil from Absolutely) would be very good, I think.
: 
: Definitely Jeff Goldblum as Death (could perfectly convey the sense of never
:  quite fully understanding what mortals are up to ).

Rutger Hauer as the VOICE OF DEATH, but he's got to look like a skeleton.

: 
: Definitely Bob Hoskins as the voice of Gaspode.

I dunno, I think the ideal voice would be the late Tony Hancock, but failing
that I think Mel Smith would be good too.

: 
: Still fancy Anthony Hopkins as the Patrician...

Yes, or maybe John Hurt.

--
*Peter Fenelon -- Research Associate -- Software Safety Assessment Procedures*
Dept. of Computer Science, University of York, York, Y01 5DD (+44/0)904 433388
EMAIL: pete@minster.york.ac.uk `There's no room for enigmas in built up areas'
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: tao@fine.princeton.edu (Terry Tao)
Subject: Re: Cripple Mr. Onion questions
Keywords: onion
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1992 18:20:51 GMT

The way I and Andrew have played it, we have used two normal decks, I mean
two English decks.  For the purposes of "Flush", "Broken flush" and"9 card
running flush", two suits are paired to gether anyway (otherwise those
hands above would almost never come up) so spanish decks are not required.
The reason we have done this is (a) Terry Pratchett refers to the Ace of
cups at one point, as well as a suit that is black and is pointy at one
end, and (b) we decided to spice up the game with 8 special cards, one from
each suit (Lady Luck = Q of spades, Fate = K of cups, etc.).


Terry

Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: johnf@apollo.hp.com (John Francis)
Subject: Re: DW Film
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 16:47:22 GMT
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Corporation, Chelmsford, MA

In article <1992Nov10.103639.1@vax1.tcd.ie> eaobrien@vax1.tcd.ie writes:
>
>  People I would most like to see the Luggage eat..
>    b) Madonna

Isn't there a photograph of this in Madonna's book ?
-- 
John Francis                                 johnf@apollo.hp.com
with 9 cats to feed, I don't have time to think up a clever .sig
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: maupb@csv.warwick.ac.uk (Mr J L Saunders)
Subject: The Spell
Organization: Computing Services, University of Warwick, UK
Date: Sat, 7 Nov 1992 14:07:46 GMT
X-Posted-From: violet.csv.warwick.ac.uk
NNTP-Posting-Host: sol.ctr.columbia.edu


Hi there!

I've only read TCOM and S so far, and I have two queries:

1) Do we ever get to know what "The Spell" is?

2) How does Rincewind get back into the UU B4 S? as in TCOM he's been
thrown out!

Thanks,

J
-- 
                       Jason L Saunders [ RouE ]      
                     email: maupb@csv.warwick.ac.uk
snail: Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK
From: jwh@doc.ic.ac.uk (James William Handley)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Terry vs Asprin vs Douglas vs Terry)
Date: 9 Nov 1992 14:08:33 -0000
Organization: Department of Computing, Imperial College, University of London, UK.
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: oak48.doc.ic.ac.uk


...<ZAP CITY>...

|> IMHO, Pratchett has more re-reads than anyone, except DNA. (tied...)
|> 
|> Asprin's not a re-read, but he's a loaner... (but no-one touches my TP or DNA)
|> 
|> Next would be Shakespeare, but not for fun...
|> I always miss the ONE point my Professor makes the next day!
|> 
|> Another good author, IMHO, is CJ Cherryh, mainly the Merovigen series...
|> 

Has anyone read any Marian Zimmer Bradley books (ie the Darkover series).
Whereas not really funny, they are fantasy, and I have to admit I can't put them
down until I've finished - bit like TP, and I also find her books good for
re-reads...

				James