Talking of Unseen Academicals...

[daibhidc]

The most common criticism I've seen of the book is that it breaks people's suspension of disbelief that foot-the-ball's been a huge spectator sport in Ankh-Morpork all the time, but has never been mentioned before.

Um, yeah. That was my reaction to the Cracker episode "To Be A Somebody". Suddenly there was this thing called Premier League Football, full of teams with names like "Liverpool FC" and "Manchester United", which was supposed to be a big deal, but had never been mentioned in the Crackerverse before. Sloppy worldbuilding, I call it.

The difference, of course, is that Cracker's set in the real world, and we therefore assume all the elements of the real world are there, waiting to be used. Discworld is a fantasy world, where we can't assume anything exists until we're told about it. But it's a mistake to slip from that to assuming it doesn't.

Comments

[rhiannon-s.livejournal.com]

I can buy the Foot-the-ball thing, since carrot was using it at the start of Jingo...and the end of Jingo too. Plus A-M has been described as a giant crowd of spectators floating around between public spectacles, they have to be doing something while waiting for Fred Colon to do something Humorous after all.

My criticism of UA is that it involves that it involves football, and then uses *that* phrase. You know the one, it is the same one the BBC feels constitutionally obliged to reference a minimum of once a week.

[daibhid-c.livejournal.com]

Yeah, there is that.

From Mitch Benn's World Cup song:

This time,
Can we teach ourselves some brand new tricks,
And never mention '66

[shriker-tam.livejournal.com]

Very big Huh?? from the non-brits in the audience...

[silly-swordsman.livejournal.com]

"They think it's all over". (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_think_it's_all_over)
"It is now!"

Sort of like "Japaner, japaner, japaner!" (http://youtu.be/0yZLBg1nyXY) but more modern and with winning and glory and pride and triumph and whatnot.