Anu's Reviews > The Colour of Magic

Precisely why all the above (below, in this review, I guess) should be so is not clear, but goes some way to explain why, on the disc, the Gods are not so much worshipped as blamed.

Have you ever wondered about what would happen if you were merely a pawn in a game played by gods? Have you ever wondered about how living in a Flat-Earth would be? Would you like to learn about what failed wizards do in their free time? Are you curious about how dragons are born and how they rest? Do you want to understand what insurance actually means? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then The Colour of Magic is the book for you. However, if you're a pragmatist, and lack imagination, I would suggest you steer clear of the book.

Welcome to Discworld; the land of the strange and scary, of the weird and wonderful. It's important to know, before you enter this magical and frankly absurd land, that you are a pawn in a life-sized game of Dungeons and Dragons. There is no escaping that. Do not make deals with Fate, do not sing prayers for The Lady; perhaps, just perhaps, you might just survive. Though, well, you do start to question whether surviving is actually worth it. Journey along with sarcastic and cynical Rincewind, a failed wizard, and Twoflower, a tourist under his care. Rincewind is an extremely likable character, a rationalist, and quick-witted to the core. Rincewind often suspected that there was something, somewhere, that was better than magic. He was usually disappointed. Twoflower, who sells inn-sewer-ants polly-see, on the other hand, is a typical tourist - he gets excited at every instance, and would rather photograph a fascinating sight than run for his life. Twoflower was a tourist, the first ever seen on the Discworld. Tourist, Rincewind had decided, meant “idiot.” Together, the two make a hilarious and engaging pair, and their story is a definite laugh riot. There are books that employ elements of satire to prove a point; this book, and I believe the series by extension, are wholly satire, and I found myself literally laughing out loud at more than one point.

The story starts at Ankh-Morpork, a city so rife with accidents, nothing quite astounds their citizens anymore. A city of thieves, fraudsters and scoundrels. A city through which flows the filthy River Ankh. In a city where public executions, duels, fights, magical feuds and strange events regularly punctuated the daily round the inhabitants had brought the profession of interested bystander to a peak of perfection. The city of Ankh-Morpork perhaps best explains human beings as a species. Their casual nature, their inclination to defraud, rather than help people in trouble, and their undying love for gold. The journey from there is a meandering one, onto the Temple of Bel-Shamharoth, the temple of the Soul-Eater. There is an escape into the world of Dragons, through an actual aeroplane (like the ones we have on Earth), and onto the Circumfence, yes, Circumfence, not circumference, because you do need a fence at the rim of the Discworld. Our two friends here, they meet heroes and villains, and creatures we mustn't speak of.

In his dry and totally British way, Pratchett mocks religion, and the religious. ...the ravaged roof of the Broken Drum, was wafted high into the Discworld’s atmosphere on the ensuing thermal, and came to earth several days and a few thousand miles away on an uloruaha bush in the beTrobi islands. The simple, laughing islanders subsequently worshipped it as a god, much to the amusement of their more sophisticated neighbors. Strangely enough the rainfall and harvests in the next few years were almost supernaturally abundant, and this led to a research team being dispatched to the islands by the Minor Religions faculty of Unseen University. Their verdict was that it only went to show. He laughs at humans and their follies, at our propensity to regale ourselves with tales of heroes of yore. As says the resident Hero of the book: “I expect in a minute the door will be flung back and I’ll be dragged off to some sort of temple arena where I’ll fight maybe a couple of giant spiders and an eight-foot slave from the jungles of Klatch and then I’ll rescue some kind of a princess from the altar and then kill off a few guards or whatever and then this girl will show me the secret passage out of the place and we’ll liberate a couple of horses and escape with the treasure.” Satire at its absolute best, whole book is.

Learn about Dragons you can summon with your imagination, and the significance of the number 8. Experience the colour Octarine, and the 8-banded Rimbow. Communicate with different languages whose words make no sense at all. Understand how magic is actually, really, quite difficult. Have hair-raising adventures with Rincewind, Twoflower, and his sentient luggage, Luggage. Curse the gods, the ghosts and the monsters. Read Discworld.

It was all very well going on about pure logic and how the universe was ruled by logic and the harmony of numbers, but the plain fact of the matter was that the Disc was manifestly traversing space on the back of a giant turtle and the gods had a habit of going around to atheists’ houses and smashing their windows.

P.S., before I sign off, my good friend, The Doctor would like to explain to you what time is, because here, on Discworld, it's important to know what time is, and what it isn't.