Discworld and the Disciplines

This collection of critical essays applies a wide range of critical frameworks to the analysis of prolific fantasy author Terry Pratchett's Discworld books. Essays focus on topics such as Pratchett's treatment of noise and silence and their political implications, art as an anodyne for racial conflict, humour and cognitive debugging, visual semiotics and hypotrochoidal texts, linguistic stylistics and readers' perspectives of word choice, and Derrida and the "Monstrous Regiment of Women." The volume also includes an annotated bibliography of critical sources. The essays provide new critical perspectives on Pratchett's work, which has stealthily redefined both fantasy and humour for modern audiences.