The Discworld Characters

I guess the best place to start with my characters of discworld lens would be the first of the discworlds' main characters, Rincewind. Rincewind is a wizard (if your thinking OOOOH! a powerful wizard, this book must be full of stuff being blown up and lots of magic and lightning. Well your wrong!), he is also not a very good wizard. Rincewind is a bit of a useless wizard because due to a silly bet by another student wizard, a lot to drink, and a magical accident he only knows one spell. That spell is one of the Eight Great spells and must not be uttered because nobody can figure out which one it is and if he says the spell he could end the world. All attempts by other Wizards to try to extract the spell have failed miserably. With one of the Eight Great spells stuck in his head he is unable to learn any other spell, because any spell he trys to learn gets pushed out by the one of the Eight Great spells.

The fact that Rincewind is unable to learn any spells means that he cannot pass his Wizarding exams so is infact to begin with not a real Wizard. (do not fear he gets the title of Wizard eventually). It turns out that Rincewind is the Chosen of the mysterious goddess 'the Lady'. 'The Lady' is the anthropormorphic representation of luck (yes, Lady Luck). Lady Luck favours him so whilst bad things, really bad things, happen to him he always manages to survive.

One of Rincewinds greatest skills is the ability to speak many different languages, although usually he is scraming something along the lines of 'please don't kill me!' His gift for languages is what ends up getting him into trouble in the first Discworld Novel (The Colour of Magic) he ends up having to play tour guide for Ankh-Morporks first ever tourist (Twoflower). Basically what happens is Twoflowers emporer decides that people who leave the empire to go on holiday are traitors and should be offed, killed, rubbed out. Rincewind gets stuck in the middle of politics and ends up having to run for his life, accompanied by Twoflower whilst trying to prevent both of them from being killed. For a Hero this would probably be quite an easy task. For a cowerd this is very difficult and involves alot of running away whilst screaming like a girl.

At the end of the second novel The Light Fantastic, Twoflower gives Rincewind his Luggage. The Luggage is made from sapient-pearwood, basically the luggage is sort of alive. The luggage runs around and hundereds of legs and will follow its master anywhere is goes (this is good because Rincewind ends up travelling all over the Discworld. He also ends up travelling back and forth through time, the luggage find this just a mild annoyance). The luggage tends to have a homicidal attitude to anyone who attacks his master.

'The Lady' is not the only of the Discworlds anthropormorphic personifications who takes a special interest in Rincewind, Death (not to be confused with death which is just a part of life) also takes an interest in Rincewind. Everyone has a life-timer, when the sands of time run out Death appears and ushers their souls into the next life. Unfortunately Rincewinds egg timer is unlike anybody elses, as the novels develop, his life-timer becomes distorted due to travelling into other plains of existance, travelling through time etc. Sometimes the sand in Rincewinds timer flow backwards, sometimes through tubes that have formed on his life-timers. Sometimes the sand flows in two directions at once. This has confused Death who tends to like things neat and tidy. Just before a Wizard is about to die they see Death, it means that they are able to put their affairs into order before the big sleep. Rincewind has seen Death on several occassions, always when he is in a situation where he has no way of surviving, always right before he is some how snatched from the jaws of death (lol).

Rincewind does become quite useful around the Unseen University (the place where Wizards are trained), he does all the jobs that nobody else wants to do, he is also the assistant Librarian (a job he likes because it is quiet and boring and no one tries to kill him while doing it. Also he gets to hang out with the Librarian who is an ape [due to a magical accident]). Rincewind does eventually become a fully fledged Wizard. He is given the title of Wizard because of the number of times he has saved the world, one time armed only with half a brick in a sock. Rincewind becomes the Universities Professor of Cruel and Unusual Geography.

Death is one of my favorite characters in the discworld (I know, it sounds really morbid that one of my favorite characters is Death, but if you read the novels you will understand). Death is not the same as death, death is merely something that happens whilst Death is an anthropormorphic personification. An anthropormorphic personification is difficult to explain, basically it goes like this, there are forces within the world which humans have a hard time dealing with so to help deal with these forces they put a face on them, personifying them, Death is one such personification. Death is like the Gods of the Discworld in that his form is shaped by what people believe Death should look like, hence why he appears to be a skeleton wearing a black hooded robe, usually carrying a scythe.

Death appears in 36 out of the 37 Discworld novels, the only Discworld novel he is not in is the Wee Free Men. As the novels progress and evolve so does the character of Death. He starts to become more human as the discworld evolves. He always claims that he has no emotions but he has on several occassions managed to aid in the preservation of the human race.

Death has a fondness of cats, who have no trouble seeing him. Humans have a difficult time seeing Death, their minds just don't want to see what they see when they see him so instead they just don't see him. He is not invisible it is more like he has a perception filter (a bit like Doctor Whos TARDIS). Cats are not the only beings who can see Death among the list are; those who have magical abilities (wizards and witches), children, the dead.

Death has quite the entourage, where there is Death usually there is his Butler Albert (Albert was once a powerful magician who made a deal with Death, to serve him until the end of time so that he would not die. Albert lives in the 'Land of Death' where he does not age or die. Albert has about 90 days left on Eaerth [Discworld] so he very rarely ventures out onto the Disc. It turns out though that Albert was the founder of the Unseen University which is the place where the majority of the best Wizards are tought how to be Wizards.)

Another character who is often seen with Death is the Death of Rats (the Grim Squeaker). The Death of Rats is not an anthropormorphic personification in the strictest sense, it is more like he is actually an aspect of Death himself, which is allowed an independant existence. The Death of Rats came into being in the Discworld Novel The Reaper Man. The Death of Rats was only one aspect that came into being when Death went missing. The Death of Rats was allowed to exist because everybody needs someone who can do and say the things that they themselves either cannot or should not. For Death the Death of Rats is a little bugger who can break all of the rules that he has to obey, which means that Death has a creature that can do everything that he would like to do but cannot because he is bound to certain rules.

The most prolific character who is attached to Death is his Granddaughter Susan Stohelit. Susan is the daughter of Death's adopted daughter Ysabell and his ex-assistant Mort. Susans' parents attempted to keep their daughter away from Death as much as they could so that she could have a normal life. It didn't work out so well!

Granny Weatherwax is one of the Lancre witches. She is the leader of her small coven which consists of two other witches. All of the covens have to have 3 witches, she can usually be found with her best friend Nanny Ogg (who she disapproves of due to her loose morals), and in the first few discworld novels written about the witches, Magrat Garlick (who later leaves the coven to get married). In the later novels Magrat is replaced by Agnes Nitt, who has ideas about how witching should be done. Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg always guide the young witches and teach them how witching should be done. Granny Weatherwax is so good at magic that she hardly ever uses it. Granny Weatherwax tends to use Headology instead of magic, this is because she knows that power corrupts, so she limits how much she uses her powers so as not to become corrupt. If Granny Weatherwax ever became an evil witch people would be terrified and the world would become a very dark place. Granny Weatherwax is a formidable opponent and commands fear and respect. She is often quite grumpy and disapproves of alot of things.

Sam Vimes is the Commander of the Ankh-Morpork city Watch. It's a dirty job but someones got to do it! Sam Vimes has appeared in 13 of the Discworld Novels. His first appearance was in Guards! Guards!

Through out the discworld novels Vimes' characters has evolved dramatically. This is mainly due to the intervention of the Patrician. He went from being a drunken lout who had lost his faith in the city to being the most respected policeman in the whole of Ankh-Morpork. With the unwanted help and guidance of the Patrician Commander Vimes rose through the ranks and not only became the head of the city watch but also became a duke.

Nanny Ogg is another of the Lancre Witches and is part of Granny Weatherwax's coven. Nanny Ogg is not your usual witch, she likes to drink and cavort. She also sings some very rude songs when she has had a drink. Nanny Ogg is a very motherly character and has a large family she has been married 3 times and has had about 15 children with 5 diffrent men (a fact that Granny Weatherwax dissaproves of). She has a swarm of daughter in laws who do the housework for her. Like Granny Weatherwax she does not tend to use magic unless completely necessary. Granny Weatherwax tends to look on Nanny Ogg as quite improper and crude (but likes her non-the-less, although she would never admit it). Nanny Ogg is a tough old bird and the best Midwife in the whole of the Discworld. This she proves in the Discworld novel the Theif of Time where she becomes the Midwife for the Godess of Time (only Nanny Ogg could have managed that!)

People like Nanny Ogg and are forever going to her for advice. People who have only just met her seem to instantly like her and want to speak to her, this is a skill that Granny Weatherwax has never managed to aquire, Granny is respected and people go to her for help when there is nowhere else to turn, but Granny knows that Nanny Ogg's gift has uses. Nanny Ogg is very wise partly due to her experiencing alot of the world has to offer (hence the 15 children) and in some ways she appears to be wiser and more knowledgeable about the world that Granny Weatherwax (but would never admit to that!) Granny is an expert on Witching, Nanny is the expert on the world and social situations.