We have met the enemy and he is us.
âWalt Kelly,
55
creator of
Pogo
comic strip
Klatch vs. Ankh-Morpork
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
âMartin Luther King
In
Jingo,
a mysterious island rich in treasures (or so the rumor goes) is a hotbed of contention between the people of Klatch and of Ankh-Morpork. Pratchett weaves the threat of war in with moments of slapstick. But more than that, we see the attitudes of the people of Ankh-Morpork and of Klatch toward each other, especially when Vimes is asked to explain a derogatory remark leveled at a visiting prince from Klatch. And even Vimes has to explore his attitude toward 71-hour Ahmed, the clove-eating cultural attaché and bodyguard. (But then, Vimes never pretends to be PC.)
The island ownership issue sparks race-related skirmishes in Ankh-Morpork. We've certainly heard about or experienced those in our country. During the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s, riots broke out in Chicago, Birmingham, and other places. The death threats during Prince Cadram's diplomatic visit to
Ankh-Morpork reminded us of the threats Martin Luther King received while organizing nonviolent protestsâthreats that culminated in his assassination in 1968. But race riots didn't end there. The verdict after the trial of police officers caught on video beating Rodney King sparked a three-day riot in Los Angeles in 1992.
War over a piece of land is a familiar tune played over centuries. In the United States as the West was settled, soldiers fought Native Americans over the plains. The Battle of the Little Bighorn in June 1876 (a.k.a. Custer's last stand) was fought over the Black Hills of South Dakota. Miners wanted the area for the gold they found. The Lakota Sioux, who had a reservation there as well as a treaty signed by the government, considered the land sacred. General George Armstrong Custer was sent to deal with the situation. Custer's troops faced the combined forces of Lakota Sioux and Northern Cheyenne warriors and lost. Fatally.
At least in
Jingo,
the war is averted. But not so with the duchy of Borogravia and its Zlobenian antagonists in
Monstrous Regiment.
Prince Heinrich wants control of the duchy. Pratchett alludes to Walt Kelly's poignant statement with Polly Perks's thought,
We have met the enemy and he is nice.
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But such thoughts don't keep her from fighting.
Agatean Empire vs. Ankh-Morpork with Rincewind on the Side
As we look at this wallâwe do not want any walls of any kind between peoples.
They're, well ⦠foreign over there.
âArchchancellor Ridcully about the Agatean Empire
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Diplomacy is a way of weaving the threads of two countries together. (It's also a way to forge powerful alliances with bigger countries with better weaponry.) In
Interesting Times,
Rincewind's enforced diplomatic trip to the Agatean Empire (a country with some aspects of China and Japan) in the Counterweight Continent reminded us of former president Richard Nixon's historic visit to the People's Republic of China in 1972, a trip that paved the way for a new foreign policy. No other U.S. president had visited China before. First time for everything. While we take for granted today that anyone can visit China (we visited China thirty years after Nixon's trip; no albatrosses were dispatched to encourage the visit), the fact that anyone can go there is probably due to Nixon's trip.
Just before that trip, then national security officer Henry Kissinger visited Beijing. But before that, an American Ping-Pong team paved the way for the visitâhence the “ping-pong diplomacy” designation for Nixon's trip.
Relations between the U.S. and China had been strained at best. But China's weakened alliance with Russia strengthened U.S. resolve to visit the country. Nixon met with Prime Minister Zhou Enlai and Communist party leader Mao Zedong. So, what did they talk about? Now that the notes from their meetings have been declassified, we know they talked about the Vietnam War, Taiwan (would it become independent?), and the Chinese leaders' fears about Japanâwhether it would continue to expand.
Discworld's Lord Hong is no Mao Zedong. Hong comes from a wealthy family. Mao Zedong was the son of a peasant who rose to wealth. Mao became the leader of the Red Army (now the People's Liberation Army)âthe revolutionaries. Lord Hong wants the Red
Armyâthe revolutionaries of the storyâto fail. But the incredibly large Chinese Red Army, begun in 1927, has similarities not only in size but also to the history of the PLA.
Unfortunately, Lord Hong doesn't factor in the chaos a Rincewind and a Cohen the Barbarian could cause. (More on chaos in
chapter 3
.) No one ever does. Suffice it to say that there's no army big enough to stop them.
Omnians vs. The Ephebians: Jihad Discworld-style
A nation's culture resides in the hearts and in the soul of its people.
Religious wars and persecution are still other ways the threads of the tapestry try to pull each other out. In
Small Gods
, Deacon Vorbis, the Quisition head, instigates war against Ephebe and anyone else who refuses to believe in “the right” godâOmâa god that Vorbis doesn't really believe in. The Islamic term “jihad”â“holy war”âimmediately leaps to mind. Vorbis also wants to persecute anyone who claims to be a devotee of the “turtle movement”âthose who believe that the world is carried on the backs of four elephants standing on a giant turtle. In his opinion, the very thought is ridiculous!
It's all a matter of perspective.
You can see the similarities between the turtle movement and early Christians who had secret signs and calls to alert or encourage one another in times of persecution. And, of course, the Quisition is like the Spanish Inquisition, a tribunal begun by King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile (a.k.a. the “Catholic
King and Queen”) in the fifteenth century in reaction to suspicions concerning the conversion of Jews to Christianity. The inquisitor general (Vorbis's office in
Small Gods
) headed the Inquisition. The idea was to maintain Catholicism in the kingdom of Castile. One way to do this was to stamp out what inquisitors believed were heretical ideas (i.e., Protestant beliefs) through the use of trials and torture. You've probably heard the saying “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition,” a saying popularized in a
Monty Python
sketch. This was because no one knew exactly when the inquisitors would roll into town. Everything was hush-hush.
Vorbis's trip to Ephebe and the war that almost results also bring to mind the Crusades, starting at the end of the eleventh century. The Crusades were a counter-jihad of sorts fought in Palestine and Syria, after Muslims tried to take back Christianized areas. The fighting went on for centuries.
Sadly, we're all well acquainted with the consequences of the jihad of our day: war in Iraq, suicide bombings, buildings toppling in New York on September 11, 2001, and so on, thanks to the efforts of Muslim extremists. As a counter-jihad to the trauma of 2001, U.S. troops were dispatched to Afghanistan beginning in 2003. It's déjà vu all over again.
To the Muslim, jihad isn't just a war against a perceived enemy, it is a duty. Think of the jihad of the Fremen led by their MessiahâMuad'Dib/Lisan al-Gaib in Frank Herbert's
Dune
(classic
Dune
). As Daniel Pipes of
The New York Post
put it, “Jihad is thus unabashedly offensive in nature, with the eventual goal of achieving Muslim dominion over the entire globe.”
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Vorbis would agree.
Males vs. Females: Gender Politics
I usually make up my mind about a man in ten seconds; and I very rarely change it.
Another rip in the tapestry is the war between the sexes. In
Equal Rites,
Pratchett addresses the issue with Eskarina's quest to become a wizardâa quest opposed by the wizards and even, for a time, Granny Weatherwax. Granny pooh-poohs the notion of women using wizard's magic (fireballs and such) not only in
Equal Rites,
but also in
Wintersmith
.
The only women the wizards gladly admit to the hallowed halls of Unseen University are Mrs. Whitlow the housekeeper, a woman they admit they're afraid of, and her staff. Occasionally Susan drops by via the rite of AshkEnte when subbing for Death. To the wizards, women aren't capable of “high” magic. They're only good for, well, womanly things like birthing babies. Hmmm.
While the Discworld series is no
Feminine Mystique,
the seminal work by Betty Friedan, it is chock-full of strong female characters trying to overcome the limitations set for them in predominantly male environments. In
Monstrous Regiment,
Polly Perks and other members of Sergeant Jackrum's regiment learn a hard fact of life that female dwarfs in Discworld already know: to get ahead in a male-dominated society, disguising one's femininity is sadly necessary. Dee learns to play the game of politics by acting and looking like a male dwarf. And Polly Perks learns the value of a well-placed pair of socks, as well as a well-aimed knee when accosted by frisky enemy troops.
There's Conina, the daughter of Cohen the Barbarian, who may
look like a helpless female but is just as deadly as Cohen. Several thugs in
Sourcery
find this out the hard way. And there's Ptraci the handmaid half sister of Teppic in
Pyramids.
Ptraci isn't your stereotypical happy harem girl. (See
chapter 11
for other strong women in the Discworld.)
Pratchett provides other moments of feminine enlightenment, all the while tweaking gender stereotypes. In
Thud!
Sally von Humpeding, the vampire Watchperson, tries to school Angua after seeing Angua trailing after Carrot with puppy eyes. In turn, Sally, Angua, and Cheery Littlebottom, the forensics recruit on the Watch, do the same for Nobby's girlfriend Tawneee, who is perfectly willing to stand by her ⦠man. (You can't help pausing when the words “man” and “Nobby” are used together.)
But for the ultimate in feminine enlightenment, there's Nobby, who dresses as a woman in
Jingo
and has a heart-to-heart chat with a group of women who complain about a man. He gets so into his role, he starts to complain about Colon's gender stereotyping.