The Hogfather by Sir Pterry

I doubt I'm the only nerd out there whose Christmas traditions include finding time to revisit Sir Terry Pratchett's take on the festive season, The Hogfather, aka the source of one of his greatest ever quotes:

“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

"They're not the same at all!"

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"

MY POINT EXACTLY.”


It is a brilliant quote - savagely, compassionately, thoughtfully direct on the essential nature of reality and humanity's relationship with it. Our attempts to shape and add to reality aren't that pink pill, they're just an intrinsic part of us, and the fairytales of youth are our early attempts at exercising that part of us. And I often think about The Hogfather in that light. A belief in the glory of humanity's imagination.

But this year, for whatever reason, what struck me most was all the many swipes Pratchett took at the reality many experience at Christmas. The arguments. The resentment. The smug sense of superiority from those who get more. The grim reality of what is it to be really, truly desperately poor in the bleak midwinter. In this respect, casting Death as the stand-in Hogfather is truly inspired; as a supernatural being who frequently sees us at our best, Death desperately wants to to believe the best of the winter festival. Instead he sees we're just the same as ever.

Now that reading may come partially from a year where my fellow humans have puzzled me more than just about ever, but it's there. It's right there.

One of the things I've come to appreciate more and more about Pratchett as I grow older is the way he's so careful to show that we're all following the same processes, the sinners and the saints and everyone else in between. We're all instinctively reshaping how reality should be based on our beliefs. What separates good from evil is often at root a very small thing - little differences about who matters and what matters and where we think other people stand compared to us. But it makes all the difference to where those processes end up. That was one of the many great things about Pratchett. He has as many things to say about good and evil as any fantasy author - for the most part about how people end up good or evil, and how so many think themselves good when they're not.

The standards we set for how reality should have a lot to do with that. And appropriately enough for Christmas, one of the things Pratchett takes a swing at is the idea that doing good things every once in a while makes you good. It doesn't. Doesn't make you evil either, but not good. Maybe more controversially, he also takes a swing at the idea that good acts done out of a desire for self-gratification and self-glorification aren't really good at all. That's not one my brain's up for unpicking this late on Christmas Day. But it links with Pratchett's idea that treating people as things is where evil starts. If you doing good treats that person as a thing in the quest for looking good, rather than a person, it's a dodgy path. That makes some sense to me.

Neil Gaiman wrote about Pratchett's anger. These days it shines brighter and brighter, a candle in the dark of everyone's fear. There's a seed of hope, that maybe we can find the story that changes how people see reality for the better. Maybe. But in the meantime, his books remain very good.