#
#
#
-%title The Colour of Magic (2)
-# p. 67 (Signet edition)
+%title The Colour of Magic (14)
+# p. 67 (Signet edition; 'Morpork': initially Ankh and Morpork were twin
+# cities with distinct characteristics on opposite sides of the Ankh
+# river--they were soon consolidated into Ankh-Morpork without regard
+# to which area was where)
%passage 1
It has been remarked before that those who are sensitive to radiations in
the far octarine--the eighth colour, the pigment of the Imagination--can
[The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
%e passage 1
+# p. 116
%passage 2
As he was drawn towards the Eye the terror-struck Rincewind raised the box
-protectively, and at the same time heard the picture imp say, 'They're
-about ripe now, can't hold them any longer. Every-one smile, please.'
+protectively, and at the same time heard the picture imp say, "They're
+about ripe now, can't hold them any longer. Everyone smile, please."
-There was a -
-- flash of light so white and so bright -
-- it didn't seem like light at all.
+There was a--
+--flash of light so white and so bright--
+--it didn't seem like light at all.
Bel-Shamharoth screamed, a sound that started in the far ultrasonic and
finished somewhere in Rincewind's bowels. The tentacles went momentarily
-as stiff as rods, hurling their various cargos around the room, before
+as stiff as rods, hurling their various cargoes around the room, before
bunching up protectively in front of the abused Eye. The whole mass
dropped into the pit and a moment later the big slab was snatched up by
several dozen tentacles and slammed into place, leaving a number of
[The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
%e passage 2
+# p. 8 (passage starts mid-paragraph)
+%passage 3
+[...] In the meantime, they could only speculate about the revealed
+cosmos.
+
+There was, for example, the theory that A'Tuin had come from nowhere and
+would continue at a uniform crawl, or steady gait, into nowhere, for all
+time. This theory was popular among academics.
+
+An alternative, favoured by those of a religious persuasion, was that
+A'Tuin was crawling from the Birthplace to the Time of Mating, as were
+all the stars in the sky which were, obviously, also carried by giant
+turtles. When they arrived they would briefly and passionately mate, for
+the first and only time, and from that fiery union new turtles would be
+born to carry a new pattern of worlds. This was known as the Big Bang
+hypothesis.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 13 (end of a long footnote; the initial obsession with 'eight' ended
+# fairly quickly within the Discworld series)
+%passage 4
+[...]
+
+There are, of course, eight days in a disc week and eight colours in its
+light spectrum. Eight is a number of some considerable occult
+significance on the disc and must never, ever, be spoken by a wizard.
+
+Precisely why all the above 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.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 38 (first speaker is Rincewind, second is a pre-Vetinari Patrician)
+%passage 5
+"I assure you the thought never even crossed my mind, lord."
+
+"Indeed? Then if I were you I'd sue my face for slander."
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 41 (title of 5th book is "Sourcery" but it's spelled "sorcery" here;
+# 'organising': British spelling)
+%passage 6
+All the heroes of the Circle Sea passed through the gates of Ankh-Morpork
+sooner or later. Most of them were from the barbaric tribes nearer the
+frozen Hub, which had a sort of export trade in heroes. Almost all of
+them had crude magic swords, whose unsuppressed harmonics on the astral
+plane played hell with any delicate experiments in applied sorcery for
+miles around, but Rincewind didn't object to them on that score. He knew
+himself to be a magical dropout, so it didn't bother him that the mere
+appearance of a hero at the city gates was enough to cause retorts to
+explode and demons to materialize all through the Magical Quarter. No,
+what he didn't like about heroes was that they were usually suicidally
+gloomy when sober and homicidally insane when drunk. There were too many
+of them, too. Some of the most notable questing grounds were a veritable
+hubbub in the season. There was talk of organising a rota.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# pp. 82-83 (passage starts mid-paragraph;
+# pronouns for deities are not capitalized;
+# Bravd and the Weasel, obviously a parody of Fritz Leiber's
+# Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, appear at the beginning of the 1st
+# of 4 stories and then are left behind, never to be seen again;
+# "wenegrade wiffard" is Rincewind and "fome fort of clerk" is
+# Twoflower the tourist; the seemingly abrupt end of the passage
+# is the end of the 2nd of the 4 stories that make up the book;
+# 'centre': British spelling; 'billion': British usage gives it a
+# value of 'million millions', equivalent to American 'trillion';
+# the second paragraph of this passage is the data.base quote
+# for "blind io" and the second half of the passage is the
+# data.base quote for "*lady" and "offler")
+%passage 7
+[...] The disc gods themselves, despite the splendor of the world below
+them, are seldom satisfied. It is embarrassing to know that one is a god
+of a world that only exists because every improbability curve must have
+its far end; especially when one can peer into other dimensions at worlds
+whose Creators had more mechanical aptitude than imagination. No wonder,
+then, that the disc gods spend more time bickering than in omnicognizance.
+
+On this particular day Blind Io, by dint of constant vigilance the chief
+of the gods, sat with his chin on his hand and looked at the gaming board
+on the red marble table in front of him. Blind Io had got his name
+because, where his eye sockets should have been, there were nothing but
+two areas of blank skin. His eyes, of which he had an impressively large
+number, led a semi-independent life of their own. Several were currently
+hovering above the table.
+
+The gaming board was a carefully-carved map of the disc world, overprinted
+with squares. A number of beautifully modelled playing pieces were now
+occupying some of the squares. A human onlooker would, for example, have
+recognized in two of them the likenesses of Bravd and the Weasel. Others
+represented yet more heroes and champions, of which the disc had a more
+than adequate supply.
+
+Still in the game were Io, Offler the Crocodile God, Zephyrus the god of
+slight breezes, Fate, and the Lady. There was an air of concentration
+around the board now that the lesser players had been removed from the
+Game. Chance had been an early casualty, running her hero into a full
+house of armed gnolls (the result of a lucky throw by Offler) and shortly
+afterwards Night had cashed his chips, pleading an appointment with
+Destiny. Several minor deities had drifted up and were kibitzing over
+the shoulders of the players.
+
+Side bets were made that the Lady would be the next to leave the board.
+Her last champion of any standing was now a pinch of potash in the ruins
+of still-smoking Ankh-Morpork, and there were hardly any pieces that she
+could promote to first rank.
+
+Blind Io took up the dice-box, which was a skull whose various orifices
+had been stoppered with rubies, and with several of his eyes on the Lady
+he rolled three fives.
+
+She smiled. This was the nature of the Lady's eyes: they were bright
+green, lacking iris or pupil, and they glowed from within.
+
+The room was silent as she scrabbled in her box of pieces and, from the
+very bottom, produced a couple that she set down on the board with two
+decisive clicks. The rest of the players, as one God, craned forward to
+peer at them.
+
+"A wenegrade wiffard and fome fort of clerk," said Offler the Crocodile
+God, hindered as usual by his tusks. "Well, weally!" With one claw he
+pushed a pile of bone-white tokens into the centre of the table.
+
+The Lady nodded slightly. She picked up the dice-cup and held it as steady
+as a rock, yet all the gods could hear the three cubes rattling about
+inside. And then she sent them bouncing across the table.
+
+A six. A three. A five.
+
+Something was happening to the five, however. Battered by the chance
+collision of several billion molecules, the die flipped onto a point, spun
+gently and came down a seven.
+
+Blind Io picked up the cube and counted the sides.
+
+"Come /on/," he said wearily. "Play fair."
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 84 (Ankh-Morpork was burned soon after Twoflower introduced the concept
+# of fire insurance; a longer version of this passage is the data.base
+# quote for "tourist")
+%passage 8
+Picturesque. That was a new word to Rincewind the wizard (B. Mgc.,
+Unseen University [failed]). It was one of a number he had picked up
+since leaving the charred ruins of Ankh-Morpork. Quaint was another one.
+Picturesque meant--he decided after careful observation of the scenery
+that inspired Twoflower to use the word--that the landscape was horribly
+precipitous. Quaint, when used to describe the occasional village through
+which they passed, meant fever-ridden and tumbledown.
+
+Twoflower was a tourist, the first ever seen on the discworld. Tourist,
+Rincewind decided, meant "idiot."
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 85 ('memorising': British spelling)
+%passage 9
+Currently Twoflower was showing a great interest in the theory and practice
+of magic.
+
+"It all seems, well, rather useless to me," he said. "I always thought
+that, you know, a wizard just said the words and that was that. Not all
+this tedious memorising."
+
+Rincewind agreed moodily. He tried to explain that magic had indeed once
+been wild and lawless, but had been tamed back in the mists of time by the
+Olden Ones, who had bound it to obey among other things the Law of
+Conservation of Reality; this demanded that the effort needed to achieve
+a goal should be the same regardless of the means used. In practical
+terms, this meant that, say, creating the illusion of a glass of wine was
+relatively easy, since it involved merely the subtle shifting of light
+patterns. On the other hand, lifting a genuine wineglass a few feet in
+the air by sheer mental energy required several hours of systematic
+preparation if the wizard wished to prevent the simple principle of
+leverage flicking his brain out through his ears.
+
+He went on to add that some of the ancient magic could still be found in
+its raw state, recognizable--to the initiated--by the eightfold shape it
+made in the crystalline structure of space-time. There was the metal
+octiron, for example, and the gas octogen. Both radiated dangerous
+amounts of raw enchantment.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 166 ('Lio!rt' with embedded exclamation point is correct; book's text
+# is missing the opening quote before ["]You arrogant barbarian--")
+%passage 10
+"I challange you," said Hrun, glaring at the brothers, "both at once."
+
+Lio!rt and Liartes exchanged looks.
+
+"You'll fight us both together?" said Liartes, a tall, wiry man with long
+black hair.
+
+"Yah."
+
+"That's pretty uneven odds, isn't it?"
+
+"Yah. I outnumber you one to two."
+
+Lio!rt scowled. "You arrogant barbarian--"
+
+"That just about does it!" growled Hrun. "I'll--"
+
+The Loremaster put out a blue-veined hand to restrain him.
+
+"It is forebidden to fight on the Killing Ground," he said, and paused
+while he considered the sense of this. "You know what I mean, anyway," he
+hazarded, giving up, and added, "As the challanged parties my lords Lio!rt
+and Liartes have choice of weapons."
+
+"Dragons," they said together. Liessa snorted.
+
+"Dragons can be used offensively, therefore they are weapons," said Lio!rt
+firmly. "If you disagree we can fight over it."
+
+"Yah," said his brother, nodding at Hrun.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 196
+%passage 11
+Some pirates achieved immortality by great deeds of cruelty or derring-do.
+Some achieved immortality by amassing great wealth. But the captain had
+long ago decided that he would, on the whole, prefer to achieve immortality
+by not dying.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 201 (entire paragraph is enclosed within parentheses)
+%passage 12
+Plants on the disc, while including the categories known commonly as
+/annuals/, which were sown this year to come up later this year,
+/biennials/, sown this year to grow next year, and /perennials/, sown this
+year to grow until further notice, also included a few rare /re-annuals/
+which, because of an unusual four-dimensional twist in their genes, could
+be planted this year to come up /last year/. The /vul/ nut vine was
+particularly exceptional in that it could flourish as many as eight years
+prior to its seed actually being sown. /Vul/ nut wine was reputed to give
+certain drinkers an insight into the future which was, from the nut's
+point of view, the past. Strange but true.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 217 (Rincewind and Twoflower are slated to become ritual sacrifices)
+%passage 13
+"I hope you're not proposing to enslave us," said Twoflower.
+
+Marchesa looked genuinely shocked. "Certainly not! Whatever could
+have given you that idea? Your lives in Krull will be rich, full and
+comfortable--"
+
+"Oh, good," said Rincewind.
+
+"--just not very long."
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
+# p. 228-229 (passage starts mid-paragraph)
+%passage 14
+[...] She was the Goddess Who Must Not Be Named; those who sought her
+never found her, yet she was known to come to the aid of those in greatest
+need. And, then again, sometimes she didn't. She was like that. She
+didn't like the clicking of rosaries, but was attracted to the sound of
+dice. No man knew what She looked like, although there were many times
+when a man who was gambling his life on the turn of the cards would pick
+up the hand he had been dealt and stare Her full in the face. Of course,
+sometimes he didn't. Among all the gods she was at one and the same time
+the most courted and the most cursed.
+
+ [The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett]
+%e passage
%e title
#
#
# Used for interaction with Death.
#
%section Death
-%title Death Quotes (10)
+%title Death Quotes (13)
%passage 1
WHERE THE FIRST PRIMAL CELL WAS, THERE WAS I ALSO. WHERE MAN IS, THERE AM I. WHEN THE LAST LIFE CRAWLS UNDER FREEZING STARS, THERE WILL I BE.
%e passage
MUSTARD IS ALWAYS TRICKY.
%passage 10
PICKLES OF ALL SORTS DON'T SEEM TO MAKE IT. I'M SORRY.
+# The Colour of Magic, p. 68 (Signet edition)
+%passage 11
+IT WON'T HURT A BIT.
+# p. 177
+%passage 12
+SHALL WE GO?
+# p. 251
+%passage 13
+I HAVE COME FOR THEE.
%e title
%e section
+#
+#eof
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