HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk (Terry Pratchett)
Subject: Passin' thru                            
Cc: tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk
Reply-To: tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 00:11:19 +0000


It's like this: by now the US has almost caught up with the
UK/Australia/NZ/Canada as far as DW paperbacks go - Roc publish them maybe a
month after the UK editions.  Everyone SEEMS to be getting more because you
don't get a US hardcover publication, so you're two (hardback) titles behind.
Roc say: "We're fed up with telling people there's no demand for them" --and
shops like Andromeda and Forbidden Planet export UK editions like crazy.
There is actually something very weird about US publishing.

And onto: Rules for writing.

Well, this worked for me:

1) Watch everything, read everything, and especially read outside your
subject -- you should be importing, not recycling.
2) Use a wordprocessor....why do I feel this is not necessary advice here? It
makes everything mutable.  It's better for the ego.  And you can play games
when all else fails.
3) Write.  For more than three years I wrote more 400 words every day.  I
mean, every calendar day.  If for some reason, in those pre-portable days, I
couldn't get to a keyboard, I wrote hard the previous night and caught up the
following day, and if it ever seemed that it was easy to do the average I
upped the average.  I also did a hell of a lot of editing afterwards but the
point was there _was_ something there to edit.  I had a more than full-time
job as well.  I hate to say this, but most of the successful (well,
okay..._rich_) authors I know seem to put 'application' around the top of the
list of How-to-do-its.  Tough but true.

Terry
From: bthand11@uctvax.uct.ac.za
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Favourite Pratchett Phrase
Date: 22 Jul 92 09:35:44 +0200
Organization: University of Cape Town

Does anyone have Heather Wood's (or anyone else's) version of "The Hedgehog
Can Never Be Buggered at All" ?  Any version appreciated. Thanks.  

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Andre' Botha				'I am here by the will of the people
University of Cape Town			 and I will not leave until I get my
Cape Town, South Africa			 raincoat back' - Metrophage
bthand11@uctvax.uct.ac.za
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk (Terry Pratchett)
Subject: Upcoming Stuff                          
Cc: tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk
Reply-To: tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 14:01:00 +0000

Just so's you know:

Only You Can Save Mankind(tm) comes out in Septembner -- the 24th, I think.

Lords and Ladies (DW) comes out in hardover in early November, along with
Witches Abroad in paperback.

Johnny and the Dead will, with luck, be out around April next year, along
with the paperback of Small Gods.

Then Guards! Guards II (real title as yet unfinalised) will be out in
hardcover in November '93 along with Lords and Ladies in paperback.

Terry
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva)
Subject: Re: Yawn.
Organization: Taronga Park BBS
Distribution: alt
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 01:54:32 GMT

In article <leo.712484418@galaxy> leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl writes:
>It should do them good to finally experience a bit of what e.g. Europeans
>(especially those in non-english speaking countries, ahem!) have to go through
>*all the time* for almost every bloody book, movie, or tv series.

OK, time to start dumping quotes from not yet released Darkwing Duck
episodes on alt.fan.pratchett in elf defence.
-- 
                                                                `-_-'
                         Have you hugged your wolf today?        'U`

Peter da Silva, Taronga Park BBS, Houston, TX  +1 713 568 0480/1032
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu (mike blaser)
Subject: DW ideas
Summary: People's own ideas for Discworld stories
Keywords: ideas thoughts idea plot plots
Organization: University of Denver, Dept. of Math & Comp. Sci.
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 92 22:04:02 GMT

So who out there has thought, at some time or other, that they had
a really good idea which would make good material for a DW book,
character or even a single gag?

Have you?  Then why not put write you ideas down here and let the other 
FlatEarth fanatics flame you to little pieces over them?  To start
the ball rolling how about this...

One of the things which works well on the Discworld is taking the 
Mickey out of existing situations/worlds.  So far Hollywood and Fairy tales
have been pretty well zapped so here's a new one.  Superheros! 

Think of it.  A band of vigilantes in rather amusing outfits sudenly appears
on the scene in Ankh--Moorpork and proceed to 'wipe out injustice and
crime wherever it may hide'.  This is closely followed by a very fast
disappearing act.  The immediate response is one of frank disbelief
by the Thieves' and Assassins' guilds closely followed by mingled anger
and panic (these superheros are GOOD and have been succesfully foiling
a lot of rather lucrative, expertly staged opperations).  The patrician
(if he's still alive!) finds that most of the guilds in the city are
starting to get rather unhappy at this (What good is a benevolent
tyrant if he can't even protect crime?) and so, of course, has to 
act fast.  Enter the City Watch (and why not? When trouble beckons call
in the Keystone Cops) who prove to be totaly useless as normal but
have lots of fun while doing it.  Now the oppertunity arises for
almost any pastiche on cop movies to be incorporated too (unless it's
been done already in Guards! Guards!).  Why not have all the guilds
contribute to making an R&D department for the Watch allowing
them to make the DW equivalent of RoboCop? Or alternatively
a total secret weapons workshop can be set up...

 "Now this one is our latest design in multiple usage anti-personel
weaponry.  We've affectionately named it 'the truncheon'."

Etc etc.  All the while more heros keep appearing, possibly created
by toxic waste effects from the river?

Just an idea anyway.  Anyone else out there got some?

Fox
--
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
  /\_/\ F    
  \O O/ O               "What is a figment anyway?" 
   \o/  X 
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: Elizabeth.Mccoy@bbs.oit.unc.edu (Elizabeth Mccoy)
Subject: Re: Johnny and the Dead
Organization: Extended Bulletin Board Service
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 18:10:06 GMT


"YA title"....

<sound of gears grinding as fan ponders>  Okay, I give up.  What does YA
stand for? Something that I've not encountered, I assume? (whimper)

--
   The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the University of
     North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Campus Office for Information
        Technology, or the Experimental Bulletin Board Service.
           internet:  bbs.oit.unc.edu or 152.2.22.80
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: johnf@apollo.hp.com (John Francis)
Subject: Re: Erm. Excuse me?                     
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 16:49:37 GMT
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Corporation, Chelmsford, MA

In article <memo.536485@cix.compulink.co.uk> tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk writes:
>Well, to prove I wasn't mad I just ran a word check on the entire DW files
>and I'M pretty sure the whole tiger/eternal flame sequence turns up only in
>Sourcery.  There was a dungeon scene in WS, yes, but with a whole range of
>fresh (well, more or less fresh) dungeon gags.
>
>Terry

Oh dear - you *really* shouldn't have posted this message.  You've just
announced to the world that you have the DW books in machine-readable form.
You're going to be inundated with requests for copies. You'd better post
another message explaining why this would not be a good idea.

Thinks:  DW in machine-readable form?  What a concept!  You could answer
interesting questions like: How many characters use the word "wossname"?

-- 
John (I want a DW coffee-table) Francis         johnf@apollo.hp.com
The world can be divided into two classes :-
 those who divide people into two classes, and those who don't.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Yawn.
From: gnat@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (Nathan Torkington)
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 10:42:50 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: Contract to CSC, Victoria Uni, Wellington, New Zealand

This group sure goes downhill as soon as the object of worship
arrives.  Suddenly we're all trying to outdo each other with puns, and
trying to flame the first moron to bait us.  Sometimes I really do
wonder whether Darwin wasn't just barking up the wrong end of the
stick (to take a Cuisinart to metaphors).

To more interesting matters - I've just finished Small Gods (due to be
officially released here tomorrowish).  I loved it.  It wasn't as
gaggy (in the comedic sense, rather than the "blowing chunks,
offloading lunch" sense) as the previous novels, but definitely was
closer to a well-rounded novel.

I tend to agree with Leo Breebaart's review (posted here before, which
I will repost/make available on an FTP site on request) - it seemed to
be a much tighter union of "points I want to make" and thigh-slappers.
One of my co-workers made the classic line: "what are you reading, a
book of quotes?" (I'd read them every second line for a page :-)

I'd be interested in knowing every last gag in SG - I'm pretty sure I
missed a couple (tho' I loved the Epidemes paradox takeoff and the
"Everything works both ways" line).  Would anyone else be interested
in seeing how sharp/blunt they are?

Nat.
(gnat@kauri.vuw.ac.nz -- Nathan Torkington -- is the electronic text and
 MS-DOS archivist for the Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: rsholmes@rodan.syr.EDU (Rich Holmes)
Subject: Re: morris
In-reply-to: mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu's message of Thu, 30 Jul 92 01:03:21 GMT
Organization: Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY
	<1992Jul29.223230.11410@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu>
	<1992Jul30.010321.29831@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 92 19:15:20 EDT

In article <1992Jul30.010321.29831@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu (Fox) writes:

>Personally, when I think about Morris dancers I think of a cross
>between a magpie and a human.  This is mainly due to their rather
>strange clothing tastes (but at least they are not fasion victims) 
>and the fact that they sew large numbers of jingly, shiny objects
>to their appareil.  The odd hankerchief is also present (and I 
>mean ODD!) but this may be substituted for rather strange club-
>like objects with paper balloons on the end.  The dances they
>weave invariably look like men with arthritis trying to walk on
>hot plates and the music would make Beethoven turn off his hearing
>aid.

Why, how very kind of you to say so!

>Actually, I'm just a tad biased as we were once thrown out of a 
>pub full of Morris dancers for shouting Monty Python lines at
>each other over our beer.  Some people have no sense of fun!

That's odd. It's usually the morris dancers that get thrown out for
singing "The Hedgehog Can Never Be Buggered At All" or the like.

On the Morris Dancing Discussion List (for info, write
libhtk@suvm.acs.syr.edu) someone recently mentioned a morris team that
confused its audience terribly by announcing every single dance they
did as being "Mrs. Widgery's Lodger". (That's the (fictitious) morris
tune mentioned at the start of Reaper Man and, I'm told, also in
Strata.)

Morris dancing is also referred to, though not by name, in Guards!
Guards!. There's a scene in which the Captain is informed of what
Nobby does in his off hours -- folk dancing, and from the description,
specifically morris dancing.

- Rich Holmes
  Bassett Street Hounds Morris Men, Syracuse, New York

--
Inspected by number 23
From: bob@castle.ed.ac.uk (Bob Gray)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Alligator Sandwich
Date: 29 Jul 92 17:39:10 GMT
Organization: Edinburgh University

rizzoe@FASECON.ECON.NYU.EDU (Emily Rizzo) writes:
>Shouldn't the proper retort be, "Sorry, we're all out of bread" (from 

No, that is the retort when the establishment boasts that
they can serve any type of food and you ask for an
elephant's toenail sandwich.
	Bob.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: dagbrown@cayley.waterloo.edu (Dave Brown)
Subject: Re: Upcoming Stuff                          
Organization: University of Waterloo
Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1992 19:56:18 GMT

In article <RSHOLMES.92Jul24003127@rodan.syr.EDU> rsholmes@rodan.syr.EDU (Rich Holmes) writes:
>In article <memo.536490@cix.compulink.co.uk> tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk (Terry Pratchett) writes:
>
>>Only You Can Save Mankind(tm) comes out in Septembner -- the 24th, I think.
>
>Whazzat?
>
>>Lords and Ladies (DW) comes out in hardover in early November, along with
>>Witches Abroad in paperback.
>>
>>Johnny and the Dead will, with luck, be out around April next year, along
>>with the paperback of Small Gods.
>>
>>Then Guards! Guards II (real title as yet unfinalised) will be out in
>>hardcover in November '93 along with Lords and Ladies in paperback.
>
>And I presume all of the above will be available in the U.S. with
>inferior covers sometime in the next millenium.
>
And, of course, lots of lovely typos... :-)

--
Dave Brown
dagbrown@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca
Phone: (519) 725-6896
"I believe the word you're looking for is, 'AAAARRGH!!!!'" - The Penguin
Xref: sparky alt.fan.pratchett:1308 rec.pets.cats:9154
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett,rec.pets.cats
Subject: Re: Cat Book?
From: gnat@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (Nathan Torkington)
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 01:05:45 GMT
Organization: Contract to CSC, Victoria Uni, Wellington, New Zealand

From the FAQ:
--begin
	The Unadulterated Cat (with Gray Joliffe)
					0 575 04628 7
--end

Cheers;

Nat.
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu (mike blaser)
Subject: Re: DW Ideas 
Organization: University of Denver, Dept. of Math & Comp. Sci.
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 92 02:09:00 GMT

tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk (Terry Pratchett) writes:

>I suppose, to be honest, I don't like people giving me ideas because
>1) what the hell, they should be writing their own books and


Question: When it comes to writing a book for the first time (if you can 
remember that far back) how does one get around the apathy aspect?  
I mean, I would personally LOVE to try to write a book (and I'm sure a lot
of other people reading this group would too) but there is a problem in
the length of time it takes to write a novel, the fact that publishers are
not even reading unsolicited manuscripts in this country at the moment and 
that there is no gaurentee a publisher would accept all the hard effort 
even if they DID read it. How can a wannabe writer pluck up the _courage_
to start jotting things onto paper?

Fox
--
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
  /\_/\ F    
  \O O/ O          "To be, or not to be.  Who's askin'?" - Popeye              
   \o/  X 
Xref: sparky alt.fan.pratchett:1163 alt.fan.rush-limbaugh:3851
From: peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett,alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
Subject: Re: New Questions for the FAQ
Date: 26 Jul 92 21:25:19 GMT
Followup-To: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
Organization: Taronga Park BBS

In article <1992Jul24.010409.18552@sco.COM> davidv@sco.COM (Uncle David) writes:
>and i hear that rush limbaugh posts/reads alt.fan.rush-limbaugh

I can't wait for Rush to discover talk.politics... :->
-- 
                                                                `-_-'
                         Have you hugged your wolf today?        'U`

Peter da Silva, Taronga Park BBS, Houston, TX  +1 713 568 0480/1032
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu (Fox)
Subject: Re: DW setting and typoes
Organization: University of Denver, Dept. of Math & Comp. Sci.
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 92 21:56:08 GMT

uhschreg@cip.informatik.uni-erlangen.de (Ulrich Schreglmann) writes:

>mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu (mike blaser) writes:

>>I know what you mean about the *** Y E S *** being off putting.  When I turned
>>over the previous page in question I was almost blasted off my chair by the 
>>force of the 24 point *8)

>You were? I see, and now I also know what "Sun"-readers find so refesh-
>ing about their literature.


>MMMMM  AAA  Y Y   TTT  H H  EE   CC  OOO  OOO  L    BB   EE
>M M M  A A  Y Y    T   H H  E    C   O O  O O  L    B B  E
>M M M  AAA  YYY    T   HHH  EE   C   O O  O O  L    BB   EE
>M M M  A A   Y     T   H H  E    C   O O  O O  L    B B  E
>M M M  A A   Y     T   H H  EE   CC  OOO  OOO  LL   BB   EE

>W W W  I  TTT  H H   Y Y  OOO  U U  !
>W W W  I   T   H H   Y Y  O O  U U  !
>W W W  I   T   HHH   YYY  O O  U U  !
>W W W  I   T   H H    Y   O O  U U
>WWWWW  I   T   H H    Y   OOO  UUU  !

>(C)OOL mcmxcii

That was TOTALLY uncalled for.  It took three people to help me down 
from the top of the bookshelf *8(

Fox

--
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
  /\_/\ F   "Have you danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?"
  \O O/ O
   \o/  X   "Oh ha de ha ha. Now shut up and finish drawing that pentagram!" 
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: graeme@sealink1.oe.fau.edu (graeme rae)
Subject: Re: morris
Keywords: literature humor minor
Reply-To: rae@sol.cse.fau.edu
Organization: Advanced Marine Systems Group 
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 22:46:01 GMT



OK I admit it, I was, once, in my dim and murky past, a Morris Dancer.
Only for a very short while, I didnt even have my own handkerchiefs!

Its a _very_ old country ritual that is supposed to ensure crops grow,
the sun rises, women give birth, men can 'perform' etc, in fact all
around fertility.

I was told at the time that quite a few women found morris dancers to
be rather sexy (I was told this by other morris dancers mind you and I
should have asked for a little more evidence). I found morris dancers
to be rather alcoholic.  As soon as the dance was over (normally 
held on a village green) there was a mad rush to the pub, accompanied
by a cacophony of bells, accordian music and the smack of walnut on
flesh. I think the last dance involving belting each other around the
head with 3 foot poles was to ensure first place at the bar.


Hope this helps!


-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
    ======     =======  //=====	graeme@transquest.oe.fau.edu (Graeme Rae)
   //    //   //    // //	(407) 367-3804
  //====//   //====// //===	Dept of Ocean Eng. Florida Atlantic Univ.
 //     \\  //    // //		"May your joys be as deep as the ocean,  
//       \\//    // //=====	and your troubles as light as its foam"
--- HOME OF THE WORLDS FASTEST HUMAN POWERED SUBMARINE --- 4.71 KNOTS---
From: gordon@robots.oxford.ac.uk (Gordon Buxton)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
Subject: Re: Alligator Sandwich
Date: 27 Jul 92 15:13:04 GMT
Organization: Robotics Research Group, Engineering Science Dept, Oxford, UK.

In article <leo.712226720@galaxy> leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl writes:
>A man comes into a fast-food restaurant whch advertises that they can
>make all kinds of sandwiches, and he says: "Give me an alligator
>sandwich, quick".
>
>I already figured I was missing something (because I can't make heads
>or tails of this 'joke'), But recently I reread "Mort", and I'll be
>damned if there isn't a reference to the same situation (the scene
>where Harga asks Death to make him an alligator sandwich).
>
>So now I know for sure I am not 'getting' it. Any ideas, anybody?
>
>-- 
>Leo Breebaart  (leo @ ph.tn.tudelft.nl)

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.  And I thought the French were
humour-impaired :-)

Those of you who are gifted with the humorous knowledge, passed down
from generation to generation of english speaking proponents of 'le
mot juste' ;+), may skip the rest of this thread now.

"Waiter, give me an alligator sandwich, ... and make it SNAPPY!"

OK? Get it?

Gordon.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Gordon Buxton			|	This is the least witty   |
gordon@robots.oxford.uk.ac      |       .sig I could manage       |
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: Elizabeth.Mccoy@bbs.oit.unc.edu (Elizabeth Mccoy)
Subject: Re: Johnny and the Dead
Organization: Extended Bulletin Board Service
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 20:28:40 GMT

In article <memo.536486@cix.compulink.co.uk> tpratchett@cix.compulink.co.uk writes:
>YA means Young Adult means vaguely adolescent.  YA books have fewer teddy
>bears and more inner city grit.

Ah. Thank you. (Now all I have to do is agitate the local bookstore to
put all the Pratchett books in the SF&F section where I can find
them...) 

--EM ("He spoke to me!" <faint>)
--
   The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the University of
     North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Campus Office for Information
        Technology, or the Experimental Bulletin Board Service.
           internet:  bbs.oit.unc.edu or 152.2.22.80
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett
From: wald@theory.lcs.mit.edu (David Wald)
Subject: Re: morris
Organization: Laboratory for Computer Science, MIT
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 14:38:43 GMT

In article <1992Jul30.010321.29831@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>
mblaser@nyx.cs.du.edu (Fox) writes:
>Personally, when I think about Morris dancers I think of a cross
>between a magpie and a human.  This is mainly due to their rather
>strange clothing tastes (but at least they are not fasion victims)

You wouldn't call people stuck in jingling rag suits "victims"?

-David
--
============================================================================
David Wald                                           wald@theory.lcs.mit.edu
   "Blessed are the peacocks, for they shall be called sonship of God"
             -- Matt 5:9, from a faulty QuickVerse 2.0
============================================================================
Newsgroups: alt.fan.pratchett