Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett | Book review

Harry Ritchie reviews the 37th Discworld novel from Terry Pratchett

Unseen Academicals

by Terry Pratchett 400pp, Doubleday, £18.99

The 37th Discworld novel finds the wizards of Unseen University facing an unthinkable calamity – swingeing cuts in their food budget. It turns out that the bequest which meets 87.4% of the wizards' ginormous food bill – all that cheese, all those pies – requires them to take part in a game of foot-the-ball, the violent and basically goal-less street sport beloved by the common folk of Ankh-Morpork.

It is up to the ever-diligent Ponder Stibbons to develop the shoving and gouging of old-school foot-the-ball into a game fit for wizards. He introduces the offside rule, goalkeepers, pointy hats for goalposts, a whistle for the referee instead of a poisoned dagger, and a ball that goes "gloing" rather than "clunk".

As for the coaching, that becomes the responsibility of Mr Nutt, a lowly apprentice down in the vats who looks a bit like a goblin, talks like Jeeves and shows the sort of appreciation of the aesthetics and philosophy of the game that makes Arsene Wenger sound like a saloon-bar dullard.

Meanwhile, below stairs in the Night Kitchen, home of the magnificent pies with the pickled onions in the crust, romance is blossoming. First to fall under Cupid's spell are Trev Likely, son of the legendary foot-the-baller Dave Likely, and the gorgeous but dim kitchen skivvy Juliet Stollop, who is about to become famous as a model for goblins' micromail (very strong, no chafing). Then it's the turn of Juliet's boss, the not-so-comely Glenda Sugarbean, to find love, not just in the bodice-ripping fiction of Iradne Comb-Buttworthy but in her own life and the unlikely shape of Mr Nutt.

There are, however, problems. Trev and Juliet belong to hostile footballing clans – he to Dimwell Old Pals, she to Dolly Sisters FC – and Glenda and Mr Nutt face the small difficulty that he is in fact an orc, a honed killing machine created by the Evil Emperor.

As for the prospects of the Unseen University's new football team, well, these don't look too good. The wizards can't tear themselves away from the cheeseboard long enough to learn the game's basics, they've been forbidden from using magic during the match, and their opponents are Ankh-Morpork United, "the toughest, nastiest bunch of buggers outside of the Tanty".

There has, however, been encouraging progress with the strip – the original large UU letters on the front having been scrapped because they looked like a bosom - and the chants: Professor Ritornello's plainchant composition ("Hail the unique qualities of Magister Bengo Macarona! Of Macarona the unique qualities Hail!") having been replaced by the more straightforward "One Professor Macarona, there's only one Professor Macarona", although with his academic honours and qualifications appended at his own insistence so that one verse takes up a page.

The secret of Terry Pratchett's comic  fantasy isn't so much the wackiness of the fantasy as the reliability of the comedy. The very least you get in any of these 400 pages is amiable, agreeable chuntering, and there is an instructively regular provision of terrific lines: the atmosphere in the Uncommon Room is "as cold as meltwater", Archchancellor Ridcully is astonished at noticing the intelligence in a servant's expression and thinks that "it was as if a chicken had winked", a lingering kiss from the luscious Juliet sounds like "a tennis ball being sucked through the strings of a racket".

There's equally effective quality control of the comic riffs – as when Stibbons replies with exhaustive honesty when Ridcully asks what the wizards need to learn about football – and of the jokes, such as Dr Hix's evil plan "to spread darkness and despondency throughout the world by the means of amateur dramatics", or the second verse of the Ankh-Morpork national anthem, which consists mainly of ner-ner-ners interspersed with occasional coherent words, because that's all anyone would remember of a second verse.  

Thirty-seven books in and with sales now topping 60m, Discworld is still going strong. That would be remarkable enough, were its author not also now writing against the loudly ticking clock of his Alzheimer's diagnosis last year – and doing so with undimmed, triumphant exuberance. 

Harry Ritchie's The Third Party is published by Hodder.

Harry Ritchie

The GuardianTramp

Related Content

Article image
Guardian book club: Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett

Sam Jordison: As usual with Pratchett, this is wildly eccentric stuff, but its sense of humour makes it hard not to love

Sam Jordison

14, Dec, 2009 @12:43 PM

Article image
Guardian book club: Terry Pratchett on Unseen Academicals
Terry Pratchett on writing Unseen Academicals

Terry Pratchett

12, Dec, 2009 @12:36 AM

Article image
The Long Utopia by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter review – a melancholy sci‑fi epic
Pratchett and Baxter’s fourth Long Earth novel is concerned with the limits of knowledge – and insectile cyborgs on a distant parallel world

Adam Roberts

12, Jun, 2015 @8:00 AM

Article image
Snuff by Terry Pratchett - review
AS Byatt: Terry Pratchett's latest Discworld novel is as inventive and full of jokes as ever

AS Byatt

21, Oct, 2011 @9:00 AM

Article image
A life in writing: Terry Pratchett

'I think there's time for at least a few more books yet'

Alison Flood

14, Oct, 2011 @9:55 PM

Article image
Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett – review
The advent of the steam train keeps Discworld nicely on track, writes Ben Aaronovitch

Ben Aaronovitch

27, Nov, 2013 @7:30 AM

Article image
Terry Pratchett: above all, he was funny
Not only did Sir Terry upend the fantasy genre and declare war on social injustice, he did so hilariously – and that is why he’ll be remembered, writes Nick Harkaway

Nick Harkaway

20, Mar, 2015 @3:30 PM

Article image
The Long Earth by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter – review

Adam Roberts enjoys an absorbing collaborative effort from two giants of SF

Adam Roberts

20, Jun, 2012 @7:00 AM

Article image
The Shepherd’s Crown by Terry Pratchett review – the much-loved author’s last Discworld novel
With his final Discworld tale, the late author continues his move away from pure fantasy and into moral and social exploration

AS Byatt

26, Aug, 2015 @11:01 PM

Article image
Terry Pratchett: 'I'm open to joy. But I'm also more cynical'

Discworld's creator tells Aida Edemariam about his new novel, living with Alzheimer's – and why he should be allowed to decide when to end it all

Aida Edemariam

01, Sep, 2010 @7:30 PM