Talk:Night Watch (Pratchett novel)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Discworld Portal
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Discworld, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Discworld articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
Start This article has been rated as Start-class on the quality scale.
Novels
Literature Portal
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Novels, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to narrative novels, novellas, novelettes and short stories on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit one of the articles mentioned below, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and contribute to the general Project discussion to talk over new ideas and suggestions.
Start This article has been rated as Start-Class.
Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the importance scale.
This article is supported by the Fantasy task force. (with unknown importance)
Assessment comments

Contents

[edit] Ned Coates

I removed this paragraph added by MartinRe because I don't think that the Coates character is important enough to appear in a synopsis and because I don't see what's so surprising (or important) about his "From how far back?" comment. (The image in my mind here is 'Fierce warrior from ancient, barbarian times' which has been used for Vimes-in-action in previous books.) 85.182.9.134 12:13, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Fair point. The image in my mind when I read Coates's comment originally was a "you too?", but I may be reading too much into it. I think Coates has an interesting part in the book: he's the only one who knew the real Keel; he was a key revolutionary; he is unfraid of Carcer, argueing with him about harming young Vimes; When he resigns, Vimes/Keel talks to him about "revolutions always come around again" (circle of time reference?). Coates also dies in the battle just like Keel/Vimes. He's also very sure ("Yes. I can.") he can imagine what it would be like if Carcer was allowed to stay in this time. (understanding or foreknowledge?) I've have wondered whether Coates is a mirror of Vimes/Keel, only his task was to make sure the revolution took place correctly. All in all, probably a little too tenuous to have in the article, but I still feel there's more to Coates than meets the eye. MartinRe 15:56, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Addition by a vandal

The following piecew is removed, since it was added by an anon with many vandalism edits, hence this addition requires independent verification.

Young Vimes believes Vimes to be the real Keel, allowing Vimes to teach Young Vimes the lessons for which Vimes idolised Keel. Essentially this means that Vimes taught and idolised himself, not Keel.
The novel climaxes in the Revolution, hinted at since the start of the book. Vimes baracades a few streets to keep people safe from the rebels, but the baracades are pushed forward gradually during the night to encompass the surrounding streets, until Vimes is under control of more of Ankh-Morpork than the rebels.

mikka (t) 19:40, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

  • The info is correct, so I placed it back. Djadek 17:55, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Parody of Les Mis

I see from the history that this was cut in the middle of a large and beneficial edit, but why is the book no longer regarded as a parody of Les Miserables? While the modified version ("A great deal of the plot is inspired by civil uprisings like the Paris Commune of 1871 and comparable ones, as depicted in Les Miserables, for example") is correct, the book has very strong ties to Les Mis in particular (see LSpace's comments) - while many are coincidental, the references to loaves of bread and the inverted definitions of justice imply a much stronger link. I'm not going to put it back in myself, but if this convinces anyone else then they can. Tyrhinis 10:49, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

That entire section (along with most of this article in fact) is original research and should be sourced or expunged but I don't have the time or the energy to do either at the moment but just something to bring up. Cat-five - talk 02:52, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Moreover the novel is rather somber in tone, especially for a Pratchett novel. Pratchess knows how to write parody, and this isn't an attempt to do so. --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 03:39, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buh?

"It is stated that the event which caused Vimes and Carcer to be sent into the past was a major temporal shattering, the implication being the cause of Vimes going through time is that he was caught in the explosion at the same instant the glass clock struck and time froze in Thief of Time." That's a bit original, eh? Vitriol 16:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Only a bit... they talk about a lightning bolt hitting a clock shop in Cunning Artificers and stopping all the clocks in the shop at once, which would tie in very strongly, and Lu-Tze's dialogue when he's explaining the situation to Vimes suggests that, if it's not happening as part of the fallout from TOT, then the Men in Saffron have managed to have another serious event pretty damn fast considering their previous record of competence. The fight that LZ and Lobsang find on the way to Jeremy's shop (where LZ warns him not to touch the hovering arrow) isn't mentioned, true, but Ankh-Morpork's a big city, I'm sure they can have more than one arrest at once. Tyrhinis 17:13, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
If you really want, you can cite the Annotated Pratchett File for support for the above statement. --Kerowyn Leave a note 19:21, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lilac

Could the lilac-wearing and the relatively non-bloody revolution be an allusion to the Portugese Carnation Revolution? What do you think? PsychoPiglet 21:32, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Life on Mars (TV series)

Somebody has remarked on Talk:Life on Mars (TV series) that Sam Tyler and Sam Vimes seem to have remarkably similar experiences. I don't think it's likely that one influenced the other, however, because the basic concept of Life on Mars seems to have been roughed out in the late 1990s, but the program wasn't made until the mid-noughties, whereas Pratchett seems to have conceived and written this 2002 novel in his usual timescale. --Tony Sidaway 23:06, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Libertarian Science Fiction

On the strength of what is this classified as Libertarian Science Fiction? I think it's miscategorized. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.159.187.3 (talk) 19:10, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

On the basis of it winning the Prometheus Award in 2003, presumably. 205.167.180.130 (talk) 20:52, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Night watch discworld.jpg

Image:Night watch discworld.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 00:58, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] BBC Radio Adaption

There's currently a serialised radio adaption on BBC Radio 4 - Does anyone have any info on that that can be added to the article? (Not a big diskworld fan, myself, but I was hooked after the first episode of the Radio play) 81.149.182.210 (talk) 22:00, 2 March 2008 (UTC)