User talk:Moishe Rosenbaum

Hi. Weren't you here before? Certainly I remember a similar handle doing a bit of good work, probably before the restart nearly three years ago.

You'll find quite a lot of material in 3760 articles here, particularly the Book and Annotations pages, as well as in The L-Space Web and other sites listed in Fandom. Whenever our AgProv shows up again he'll likely have ideas - a few off the top of my head:

• Comparison to Jonathan Swift, Miguel de Cervantes, discussion of parody in general; parody vs satire.

• Comparison to modern observational comics: I've always thought that George Carlin did much the same kind of work in a short, punchy stand-up format without the plotting and character development.

• Probably my favorite device of Pterry's (your wife might have a name for it) was his knack of telling a story without action words, just describing the resulting scene so that you knew what happened without explanation.

Good luck spreading the word. --Old Dickens (talk) 01:11, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Old Dickens... You're right that I worked here a bit one summer, in the Time When Things Were Otherwise And The Moon Was Different, I suppose. Good to be back. I never thought of the Carlin comparison, but it seems apt. Thanks for the welcome, and the comments.Moishe Rosenbaum (talk) 19:53, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

A football legend called Moishe Rosenbaum.... I can see the humour here. Apparently one member of England's 1966 World Cup squad was ambiguously Jewish, and Liverpool's world dominating squad of the late 1980's boasted Israeli international Ronnie Rosenthal, whilst Tottenham Hotspur are based in the most Jewish part of North London and are nicknamed The Yids (by their own fans... they take pride in a Jewish identity of club and area) .. but that's pretty much it.... welcome back to our fellowship. The only idea that occurs off the top of my head:

• Charting the evolution of the standard "monster" types through the history of the Discworld novels. From their roots in folklore, other peoples' fantasy fiction, and perhaps in tabletop gaming. How the vampire evolves in Discworld, for instance, from versions recognisable by Bram Stoker and F.W. Murnau through Hammer Horror films (Christopher Lee), to Anne Rice's navel-gazing angst-ridden creation, to Whitley Streiber's, and on to 1990's film interpretations such as Gary Oldman's 1992 film version. The way the legend is universal and vampires are in virtually everyone's folklore - but methods for despatching them vary wildly and ridiculously, as do the powers the individual vampire can call upon. (Count Notfaratou v the Count de Magpyr v Otto Chriek v Sally von Humpeding). The idea that the blood-lust is a craving and one addiction can replace another.... and how, if taken past absurdity, everything is fair game for humour.
• You could do similar exercises for trolls, elves, golems, werewolves, et c, as presented in the Discworld. How trolls finesse the sunlight thing in a civilization which has evolved deep-freezes and barrier cream. In our world, people of different races find it hard to get along. How would a world with a dozen different sentient species work - how do they all coexist? --(Unsigned comment by AgProv, who has been away a few days and forgotten the drill, 19 Jul 2015)

Thanks, AgProv! I really like the idea of using the theme of species evolution, from trope to modern Ankh-Morporian. That would give me an excuse to dig into the folklore a bit. That's something I know a wee bit about, but not really a whole lot.

I've used this wiki to look at annotations, especially of the recent books. The old APF seemed reasonably comprehensive for older books; there seems to be plenty of room in this wiki for expansion of annotations beyond APF and what's here already. That's probably what I'll work on when I have a chance. Of course, annotations are really, really tough -- every time I dig into what seems to be a straightforward reference, I get what could be an entire research paper. So there's an idea for a course right there. Sure, the Beverly Hills Cop scene in Men at Arms couldn't be more obvious, but what if anything is the historical basis for Moist von Lipwig? And who are all the roundworld characters amalgamated into William de Worde? Usually, the simplistic answer is too simplistic.

I got myself a hard copy of Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, which Sir Terry said he used extensively. He wrote the introduction to the edition I have. Between that, The Folklore of Discworld, this wiki, and just the general internet, there seems to be all sorts of background information on the Discworld species, and how Pratchett uses and references them. Do youall know of any other specific sources I should be aware of?

And Moishe owns a fantasy *american* football team, i.e. Robot Rugby. That said, I'm spending August in London with my family on sabbatical. I'm going to spend a good bit of time digging into (English) football culture, attending games, touring grounds, etc. When I broadcast baseball and american football, I'm drawing on three-plus decades of experience listening to and watching games. I've only been following association football carefully since 2011 -- haven't missed watching more than a couple Arsenal games in that time. So I think Moishe is going to have to deal this season with a new co-owner, one who doesn't understand why the referee is dressed like a Newcastle supporter, and why he doesn't hand out red cards for some of those bone-crunching tackles. Thanks for the comments and ideas!Moishe Rosenbaum (talk) 16:57, 19 July 2015 (UTC)