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Mar. 13th, 2015 07:53 amI read Terry Pratchett's Colour of Magic shortly after it came out in the US. '84 maybe? I loved it. It was different from anything else out there at the time - fantasy that didn't take itself seriously, except that it was written with all due seriousness. It read like something Piers Anthony might have put out had he not stuck himself permanently at an 11-year-old level. (But I digress.) The sentient pearwood luggage! Inept wizards who weren't the same old doddering Merlin clones. It was great fun, and I devoured it quickly.
The next book? Not as fun, but I still read it. And the next, which was the same. And the next. At some point, I realized I was reading them out of obligation because it was a series. (Although I enjoyed most of Mort, which finally felt original.) By the time I got to Moving Pictures in 1990 or so - which read like a self-parody written as a contractual obligation rather than inspiration - I'd had enough. I stopped. I never went back.
I've heard that he got much better afterwards. It didn't matter: I was done. (I did read Good Omens, because by then I'd discovered Gaiman; but I didn't like it. It was too Pratchett in tone for me.)
There's a related personal aspect here, which is a certain amount of cussed contrariness. When I don't like something and people tell me "Oh, you must love this!" I have a tendency to react negatively. No, I don't must. I said I didn't; and I definitely will not now. Not an incredibly positive trait perhaps but there it is. The more I'm pushed, the more I may push back. I had lots of friends who kept rhapsodizing about how great Pratchett was. Any tendency I might have had to try later books completely vanished.
So, I note Pratchett's death because he was part of the literary universe I inhabit. It was not my part, but it still lessens the whole.
The next book? Not as fun, but I still read it. And the next, which was the same. And the next. At some point, I realized I was reading them out of obligation because it was a series. (Although I enjoyed most of Mort, which finally felt original.) By the time I got to Moving Pictures in 1990 or so - which read like a self-parody written as a contractual obligation rather than inspiration - I'd had enough. I stopped. I never went back.
I've heard that he got much better afterwards. It didn't matter: I was done. (I did read Good Omens, because by then I'd discovered Gaiman; but I didn't like it. It was too Pratchett in tone for me.)
There's a related personal aspect here, which is a certain amount of cussed contrariness. When I don't like something and people tell me "Oh, you must love this!" I have a tendency to react negatively. No, I don't must. I said I didn't; and I definitely will not now. Not an incredibly positive trait perhaps but there it is. The more I'm pushed, the more I may push back. I had lots of friends who kept rhapsodizing about how great Pratchett was. Any tendency I might have had to try later books completely vanished.
So, I note Pratchett's death because he was part of the literary universe I inhabit. It was not my part, but it still lessens the whole.
