Going Postal Discussion *Spoilers*

[kakaze]

Someone asked Terry about the chapters at the Con.

He said that it wasn't do to pressure from editors or publishers. He said that he just always liked the little teasers that you saw in the very old movies. That's also the inspiration for the little artwork (pointing fingers, etc) in the chapter titles.

[Tonyblack]

Indeed - those chapter teasers are a really old thing. If you read Gulliver's Travels (1726) it has the teasers at the start of the chapters.

[Lady Vetinari]

Charles Dickens also wrote 'teasers' at the beginning of his chapters - some of the titles of his takes up half a page! That is what the chapter headers of Going Postal and Making Money remind me of.

Whilst I like Moist - I prefer William De Worde... I'd like him to have another chance!

[Tonyblack]

You now have just one week to read or reread Thief of Time for the discussion starting on Monday 5th October.

[kakaze]

I just read something interesting. The clacks were real! In 1793 a French man named Claud Chappe built a mechanical signaling system like a semaphore mounted on a vertical post. It was able to send a short message 21 miles in 11 minutes and apparently could send messages from Paris to Marseilles in half an hour.

Three years later England built a similar, but simpler, mechanical telegraph but it only lasted a few years before it was displaced by the electric telegraph.

[Tonyblack]

I just read something interesting. The clacks were real! In 1793 a French man named Claud Chappe built a mechanical signaling system like a semaphore mounted on a vertical post. It was able to send a short message 21 miles in 11 minutes and apparently could send messages from Paris to Marseilles in half an hour.

Three years later England built a similar, but simpler, mechanical telegraph but it only lasted a few years before it was displaced by the electric telegraph.

Absolutely! Semaphore devises were used a lot during the Napoleonic Wars. In one of the Sharpe books by Bernard Cornwell (I've forgotten which ) part of the plot revolves around getting a message via the semaphore.

[CrysaniaMajere]

wow, i'm getting quite an education on this forum . I had never heard of that.

[kakaze]

wow, i'm getting quite an education on this forum . I had never heard of that.

1. Mr. Pratchett's books are simply stuffed with historical & cultural references.

2. We (the readers) can be increadably obsessive sometimes.

3. I'm in the middle of a very interesting book about Victorian technology.

[Tina a.k.a.SusanSto.Helit]

wow, i'm getting quite an education on this forum . I had never heard of that.

Isn't it Wonderful? I learn all kinds of history which I missed out on during my unfortunate incarceration in a christian school in the Dominican Republic for 1 1/2 years. These guys make up for it with their extensive knowledge and while I am great with computers and higher/scary maths, these guys are simply fantastic as a base of knowledge on EVERYTHING else, And the puters and maths LOL I love it here and even YOU Pooh!

[Tonyblack]

Actually, semaphore was used a lot earlier with the means of flags. The large towers simply meant that a larger signal could be seen from a long way off.

The CND sign like this:



Is actually made up of the semaphore signals for 'N' and 'D' as in 'Nuclear Disarmament'.

[kakaze]

Actually, semaphore was used a lot earlier with the means of flags.

Yeah, I knew that. I'd just thought the idea of building a string of semaphore towers across the land to send short messages quickly was just a figment of Terry's imagination.

I just think it's too bad they waited until four years before the electric telegraph before coming up with the idea...

[Tonyblack]

Yeah, it did make the whole thing obselete really quickly.

[Jan Van Quirm]

Was Bill Gates related to the inventor of the Roundworld clacks by any chance? MS seem to have got the hang of built-in obsolesense (mispelt? but cant' be arsed to look it up) pretty bloody quickly...

[chris.ph]

im sure pooh will correct you jan

[Jan Van Quirm]

Thank goodness he's back chris - I won't be able to relax until he's been in and put me right