rereading Pterry

[ksmith]

For the past few weeks, I've been trying to pull away from nighttime screens by reading actual paper books. Imagine!

I've started with an out-of-sequence Pterry reread. First, Hogfather, because it seemed appropriate for December. Followed up with Guards! Guards!, then Lords and Ladies.

Now I'm reading Jingo, which seems appropriate to the times in so many ways. It also contains one of my favorite, idk, processes? Namely, Lord Vetinari* manipulating Sam Vimes into acting like, well, Sam Vimes.

*Lord Vetinari is one of my "Spock crushes**." In my mind, he's played by Alan Rickman.

**crushes on literary/film/TV characters. Mr. Spock was my first. Lord Peter Wimsey. Loki from the Marvel TV series. And Vetinari.

Comments

[ksmith]

The thing that nailed it for me was Pterry's description of Vetinari as looking like "a carnivorous flamingo." Decades ago, I read an article about the stage play of Les Liaisons Dangereuses in which Rickman played Valmont, and how the costumer obscured his skinny legs by dressing him a robe that sort of swirled/obscured. That's not the only reason I think of him as Vetinari—his voice and how he used it also helped nail it. His overall build.

I do like the actors who've played Vetinari to this point—Charles Dance, Jeremy Irons—but they lack that snakiness that Rickman pulled off so well.

[sartorias]

It was his voice, and the weary sardonicism in his manner that cinched it for me.