WROUNDWORLD
Owen Burgoyne
The soft, subdued sunlight streamed through the glass dome of the Library at Unseen University. It was, Rincewind had always thought, quite a nice effect. It gave the Library a certain ambience; a certain je ne sais quois. And where there was light, there were shadows. And in these shadows lurked the more ... sinister volumes.
Of course, this was something that didn't worry Rincewind, since he had very little cause to walk down those aisles - he usually left that to the Librarian, who not only walked down the aisles, but swung, climbed, and moved down them in the only way that an animal with full use of its four limbs could. However, since Rincewind had been promoted to the chair of Egregious Professor of Cruel and Unusual Geography he spent very little time in the Library these days, except for when he didn't mind having a conversation with someone who's answer to everything was "Oook".
Today was one of those days.
"Ooook ook eek oook," said the Librarian. He sipped from a glass of ice-cold water.
"Well," said Rincewind, "that's what happens when you go around tasting stuff just because you don't know what it is."
"Eeek eek!"
"Don't look at me! I didn't know it had chillies in it!"
"Ook," grunted the Librarian, as he unfolded from underneath his desk and knuckled down one of the friendlier rows of books.
Rincewind was just about to get up and follow him when there was a knock at the Library's door. He ambled over and opened it to be faced with a small and unassuming man. He was wearing a black hat with a large brim and an unkempt grey beard inhabited his face.
"Er ... hello?" said the man, looking up.
"Hello," said Rincewind. "Can I help you at all?"
"I'm, er, looking for someone called Wrincewind."
"Don't you mean 'Rincewind'?" said Rincewind.
"Yes, that's what I said."
"Well, that's me," said the wizard, walking him into the Library. "And you are...?"
"Mr T. Pwritchard. Of the Writers' Guild. In Ankh-Morpork," said the man.
"Mr Pwritchard?" said Rincewind.
"No, it's Pwritchard," corrected the man.
"Ahh," said Rincewind, the man's slight speech impediment slowly dawning on him. "Mr Pritchard. Well, Mr Pritchard, what can I do for you?"
"I believe you work for the Libwrary, don't you?"
"Yes, that's right. Well, I say work - more worked, really..."
"And you were involved in the..." His eyes darted around the room, and he lowered his voice to a whisper. "You were involved in the Wroundworld pwroject, were you not?"
"You're not from The Ankh-Morpork Times are you?" asked Rincewind suspiciously.
"No no no," he said dismissively. "I'm a writer, not a journalist. I write stowries."
"Ah, a teller of tales," said Rincewind, thinking that's what a journalist pretty much sounded like to him.
"Yes, that's wright. Anyway, I heard about your Wroundworld pwroject fwrom a fwriend of a fwriend if-you-know-what-I-mean, and it inspired me to write some stowries about it."
"And this involves me how?"
Mr Pritchard handed Rincewind a couple of manuscripts. "I've only written a couple at the moment," he said, "and I was hoping that you might be able to give some information on the wreal Wroundworld. You know, a few pointers."
Rincewind looked at the first bundle of pages. "This first one," he began.
"Yes?"
"You've called it Octarine."
"Well, I thought that Wroundworld sounded ever so magical," explained Mr Pritchard excitedly, "and, well, octawrine is the colour of magic, after all."
"Er, I don't know how to put this," said Rincewind, "but, er ... Roundworld doesn't run on magic."
"No?"
"Er, no. It runs on rules." Rincewind could see the waves of confusion crashing over Mr Pritchard's brain. "Trust me, I've been there."
"You mean, it doesn't work on magic? It's not like our world?"
"No."
"Oh dear," sighed Mr Pritchard, visibly sagging.
"And this second one?"
"Yes?"
"Why did you call it Ye Lyght Fantastyk?"
"Because it gives the reader the impwression of its inhewrently ... magical ... content..." Mr Pritchard's voice faded out. "Oh."
Rincewind looked at the first page. It began:
The sun rows slowly, as if it was not sure it was worth all the effort. Another Roundworld day dawn'd, but very gradu'ly, and this is why.
When light encounters a stronge Magickal Field it loofes all sens of urgensy. It slows right down. And on the Magickal Roundworld the Magick was embarrasfingly stronge, which meant that the soft yellow light of dawn flowed over the sleeping landfcape like the caress of a Gentle Lover or, as some would have it, like marmalade.
"So," started Rincewind, noting the appalling spelling, "you say you're from the Writers' Guild?"
"Mm-hmm," nodded Mr Pritchard.
"Been there long?"
"Not wreally."
"I didn't think so," said Rincewind. "Well, I really have to, er, be getting on with ... something. Yes. I definitely have something to do. Somewhere else."
"But ... what about my stowries...?" said Mr Pritchard pathetically, as Rincewind trailed off down one of the aisles. "Did you like them...?"
But, by then, Rincewind was too far off down the rows of books to hear him.
Well, what did you think? Yes, I know the Mr T. Pritchard/Terry Pratchett connection was a little weak, but it was either that or Mr Wollycobble. Of course, as we know, Terry Pratchett is a much better writer than Mr Pritchard could ever be (hence his rather bad marmalade simile), but if you've had the chance to read The Science of Discworld II, then all I can say is that Mr Pritchard is pretty much the Discworld equivalent of Arthur J. Nightingale.
Incidentally, the first two passages from Mr Pritchard's Ye Lyght Fantastyk are an almost word-for-word version of the opening to The Light Fantastic (which is copyright © Terry Pratchett 1986). And I'm sure that you must have noticed the reference to The Colour of Magic - if you didn't, it was that Mr Pritchard's first story was called Octarine which is, of course, the "colour of magic".