Speak His Name - Tumblr Posts
Neil Gaiman, co-author of Good Omens:
My first encounter with Terry Pratchett was The Colour of Magic, as read on BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour. I was a young journalist and I reached out to his publisher for an interview, and thus became the first journalist to interview Terry Pratchett, in Bertorelli's Italian restaurant, in Gower Street. (We remembered it as a Chinese Restaurant in Goodge Street, demonstrating either the fallibility of memory or our fondness for Chinese food.) We became friends.
I was lucky enough to read Terry's books as he wrote them, to become one of his beta readers, and then to collaborate with him. Terry had a brilliant eye for the places where reality and narrative tradition intersect: he had a science fiction writer's mind, let loose on a fantasy world, and he loved to explain and show how things came to be. The last time we saw each other he told me I had to read a book about feeding Nelson's navy – and I still wonder, had he lived, about the Discworld novel he would have written, about ships, and naval battles and all, and the lessons he would have taught us. Because at his best, Terry was a teacher. The kind who makes you laugh while simultaneously realising that everything you have taken for granted so far is utterly wrong. I miss him.
A truly impressive Easter Egg gathering
Today is Sir Terry Pratchett's birthday. So, why not celebrate with some of the easter eggs we have in Good Omens that are all about him.
Mind how you go.
Finished watching The Amazing Maurice movie. And I think they could have improved it, but understand why they didn’t. I reckon The Amazing Maurice could be a TV series, either live action or animated, and I think that as a book this makes sense.
The Amazing Maurice is One of the Darkest Discworld books, there are things and it largely gets away with it because it’s Rats. And I think that’s the attitude the movie should have capitalised on.
I could imagine a community waiting to watch the power dynamics and struggles, a TV series which transcends the traditional “animation is just for kids” which more shows should strive to do. Because thats what the book is like. It is so adult whilst being so whimsical.
In short, it’s a movie that got the characters right, got the basic just of the story, and I do not regret watching. And maybe who knows, we could see another adaptation.
(I also think that Wee Free Men would make a great 2D animated TV series, but Now is not the post for that)