[HN Gopher] Newly discovered Terry Pratchett stories published
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Newly discovered Terry Pratchett stories published
Author : madaxe_again
Score : 62 points
Date : 2023-10-11 08:25 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theguardian.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theguardian.com)
| rsynnott wrote:
| > There are lots of 1970s in-jokes and references, which may
| baffle readers from later generations
|
| In fairness, this is something he kept doing, albeit with more
| contemporary references, hence the Annotated Pratchett Files:
| https://www.lspace.org/books/apf/
| Popeyes wrote:
| It's probably more interesting (rather than the argument about
| whether these should have been published) to note that local
| newspapers carried short stories for publication. And while we
| have a multitude of publishing platforms, a local paper like that
| would have had a far more diverse readership.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Still do, I think? Small local papers will often take
| practically anything, if it fills pages.
| mcphage wrote:
| He's got a book of short stories, which seem related to or
| variants of some of these, called "The Dragons of Crumbling
| Castle", written while he was younger. And the same thing this
| article says applies to that book as well--some of them are good,
| some you see the hint of humor that he later hones, but on the
| whole, they're not that strong.
| nottorp wrote:
| That goes for any writer. Take the complete works of Lovecraft,
| for example, because they fit in one thick volume.
|
| The ones at the beginning are ... skippable. But then he
| perfected his style.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Any artist, or even craftsman in general. You only judge
| people by their masterpiece's standard. So anything lower
| will always have that meh feeling.
| somnic wrote:
| I think that's generally true, but it can still be
| interesting to see early works from people who go on to
| hone their crafts. Sometimes just seeing how they
| progressed is worthwhile, sometimes the unpolished nature
| can emphasize brilliance, and sometimes the unintentional
| breaks from convention have engaging effects of their own.
| mcphage wrote:
| And "Dragons of Crumbling Castle" is good for that. Like
| thinking of one of the stories in particular, is very
| clearly the kind of humor that he perfected in Discworld.
| But it's just too much, it's not _sharp_ enough. It 's a
| broad blade which he later turns into a scalpel.
|
| And they're not _bad_ stories, just most are a bit dull.
| There was one I especially loved though, so I 'm glad I
| read them, and my kids liked them as I was reading them
| out loud.
| [deleted]
| losvedir wrote:
| It's interesting because the idea that they hone their craft
| is in contrast with the other author aphorism that "you have
| your whole life to write your first novel, and one year to
| write your second".
|
| I wonder if the ideas in the early works are any more
| interesting or creative, but just not written as well.
|
| I think this tension between planning and upfront design on
| the one hand and just executing something* on the other
| applies to software engineering as well.
| sylware wrote:
| [flagged]
| [deleted]
| eesmith wrote:
| They were published in the 1970s and 1980s under a pseudonym.
| Popeyes wrote:
| Terry Pratchett is one of the sacred treasures of a section
| of society, and when you raise questions about him or his
| work you can be expected to downvoted to oblivion.
|
| (Replying to this because the other user has been flagged -
| for what I imagine is a fairly uncontroversial comment).
| eesmith wrote:
| The comment had nothing to do with the linked-to article.
| It suggested ChatGPT was involved, followed by a "sarcasm"
| disclaimer.
| hoseja wrote:
| It's only a matter of time until they publish a "newly
| discovered work" of a famous author that's just an AI
| forgery. Hasn't it happened yet?
| probably_wrong wrote:
| Forgeries already exist, no AI needed. So arguably the
| detection method would be the same.
|
| But in a more general sense, whether that happened
| depends on what you mean with "publish". If you mean
| "someone put it on Twitter and no one corrected them"
| then yes - it happens all the time with highly-
| anticipated books (I definitely read at least two fake
| Harry Potters back in the day) and no one corrects them
| because they are obviously fake.
|
| Now, if you mean "a respectable publishing house put it
| for sale" then I doubt it happened. No decent publishing
| house would take (say) a new Lovecraft before giving the
| state a call and/or asking for the receipts.
| sylware wrote:
| weak/uneducated minds cannot understand _explicit_
| sarcasm, leave it be, this is internet, don 't worry.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I'm not sure it qualifies as any sort of sarcasm. It's
| just a non-sequitur.
| sylware wrote:
| "(irony)" means irony and means sarcasm.
| eesmith wrote:
| Labels like "sarcasm" and "jk" are also used by trolls
| who want to troll but don't want the consequences.
|
| Often with a follow-up like "can't you take a joke?"
| bbarnett wrote:
| _They were published in the 1970s and 1980s under a
| pseudonym._
|
| Yes I asked Bing/ChatGPT this, and the search results told me
| the very same thing!
|
| --
|
| I wonder if some day we'll be hitting this. Search engines
| are throwing AI generated responses as search results, and I
| imagine soon we'll be giving AI more of a "memory" of recent
| things it has said and done.
|
| I imagine it covering its tracks. Even better when Wikipedia
| adds an AI editor, sourced from the same company backend.
|
| Each edit you make to fix the truth, is reverted by the same
| delusional AI.
|
| Then the undiscoverable untruths begin.
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