Terry Pratchett: A Life With Footnotes: The Official Bi… (2025)

‘No one is finally dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away – until the clock he wound up winds down, until the wine she made has finished its ferment, until the crop they planted is harvested. The span of someone’s life is only the core of their actual existence.’
— Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man

It took me a few months before I actually read this biography of Terry, written by his long-time personal assistant Rob Wilkins, even though I bought it the day it came out. Honestly, I was just not ready to read about Terry succumbing to early onset Alzheimer’s, the “embuggerance” that creeped up robbing him of what made him Terry Pratchett, the writer and the person, until it prematurely robbed him of his life.

And yes, I quietly cried through quite a few pages in the end.

But before that, through Wilkins’ narration based on the time he spent with Terry and Terry’s drafts of his autobiography (even if it may have been full of things “too good to check” I got to know Terry Pratchett at the height of him being himself. And it was worth it, every single page.

‘Your reward for doing something good,’ Terry has taken to saying, ‘is to do something else good.’

“There isn't a way things should be. There's just what happens, and what we do.”
― Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky

He was brilliant and funny and grumpy and a decent person overall, and that’s quite something.

‘Of all the dead authors in the world,’ John said fervently, ‘Terry Pratchett is the most alive.’ It felt entirely true to me at that moment, and it feels entirely true to me now.

“And then I will help him put on his clean clothes, and we will go back to work – the work that he is so determined to continue doing. Because the work has always been the most important thing, but it has taken on a whole new dimension now. Work is Terry’s last defence against this cruel disease which is stripping him of himself. For as long as he writes, he is still Terry Pratchett.”
————
“The book nudged forward by degrees, painfully slowly. But every day that Terry stuck at it was another day that Terry was still a writer. And every day that Terry was still a writer was another day that Terry was still alive.”

It’s a great biography, but be prepared to feel some raw pain if you care about Terry Pratchett at all, because by the end of it you’ll care about Terry as a person and not just an absolutely brilliant writer.

Loved it, even if I’m shamelessly wiping tears right now.

“People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact, it's the other way around.”
― Terry Pratchett, Witches Abroad

——————

Also posted on my blog.

This is desperately moving. It's a biography of Terry Pratchett, one which makes it clear he was not the friendly grandpa people assumed because of the hat/humour/twinkly eyes. He was thin skinned, and prone to grumpiness and indeed spectacular rage, and basically was human with human failings. On the showing of this he was also a very decent person, unspoiled by wealth, who conducted his personal life well and wrote terrific books and was passionately interested in a massive variety of things and people.

Writing was mostly what he did. There isn't a huge amount to sustain a biography in the usual way of things. There is, however, the Embuggerance: this brilliant author's horrifically early slide into dementia via a particularly virulent form of Alzheimers that took away his memories, his ability to make connections, his words.

The cruelty of this is apparent here not just in the impact on Terry, but in the writing by his PA/manager of many years. I hope he's had therapy, possibly for PTSD, because these pages read like a traumatised man wrote them. The disease looms over the book, going into frank detail about the impact it had on Terry and on the people around him and his writing, and if you are coping with a loved one and dementia, I'm warning you, it's raw and painful and incredibly moving. I was sobbing bitterly over this: over the loss of the irascible, brilliant man, and the author I loved, and the books he'll never write--Susan as headmistress of a girls school! Moist becomes chief tax collector! Goddammit, goddammit.

If you loved Terry Pratchett you will love this. A great tribute. Can we find a cure for this monstrous disease already please.

Despite Terry Pratchett being my all-time, absolute favourite author, I never really cared much to find out more about his life. It never seemed like I needed to, everything I needed to know was written within the pages of the Discworld books I was reading: how he viewed humanity, how humorous he was and how compassionate he was about pretty much everything.

His wit, indeed sparkling as it was, and his intelligence was plain to see from what he had written, up until the very (rather bitter) end. The only reason I read this book was because it was about PTerry and it only felt right that I should.

Terry's life was much like anyone else's, with humble beginnings that drifted into anecdotal rich midlife that didn't so much as crash as it sort of free-wheeled with a few minor stalls. There are no startling revelations or cryptic clues as to how to become as successful as he was. Ordinarily, Terry was a man who worked incredibly hard and whinged sometimes and the holy grail of how to be a writer is simply to write.

The book is indeed in chronological order, written by PTerry's PA, Rob Wilkins, who had known PTerry for so many years and, it was indeed, his own fingers that typed many of the Discworld books long before PTerry might have lost that function due to his illness. This was a new piece of information for me, but, although brought initial surprise, did not change any thoughts. So it was only natural for him to write his biography, as well. Would it have been better had PTerry written it himself? Yes and no. Anyone can tell their own story, it's whether that story is true or not that matters. Rob allows a sideways glance at PTerry's life, from the perspective of a fan, employee and friend.

It paints the picture of a writer who loved what he did. Adored it, was bewildered by it sometimes, often doubted it and his own success, but never once took it for granted. A writer who worked incredibly hard and got his just desserts, until sadly his imagination was so diminished by a cruel disease that ultimately killed him.

A hard, beautiful, solemn thing to read. GNU Terry Pratchett.

I wasn't sure what I was going to make of this to be honest. I have been a Pratchett fan since pretty much the beginning and my loyalty and love to Sir PTerry is one of the constants of my life. I didn't know what Rob was going to do in this book and I was very, very nervous. I needn't have worried. This is a wonderful, funny, glorious and deeply moving thing. I read it so fast and then as the last chapter loomed I slowed right down because I just didn't want it to end. And when I finally finished it, I cried and cried and cried.

The perfect homage to a great man and his writing.

Para empezar tengo que aclarar que no me gustan mucho las biografías, pero de leer una biografía, tenía que ser esta.
Como buena fan de Terry Pratchett y de su Mundodisco, estaba deseando descubrir más la vida y carácter de un autor que siempre ha conseguido alegrarme la vida con sus novelas cuando algo se torcía. Aunque llevo leyéndolo mucho tiempo, tampoco me he llegado a obsesionar, lo leo cuando me apetece y de manera aleatoria, y además, no soy nada cotilla de la vida de los autores que me gustan, por lo tanto se puede decir que abrí las páginas de esta biografía (bellamente editada, por cierto) sin saber muy bien lo que me iba a encontrar.

Y me encontré con un libro de 500 páginas lleno de anécdotas, de pequeñas historias y situaciones (algunas irrelevantes y otras inolvidables) que van dando forma a ese hombre gruñón, repleto de ira, trabajador hasta la médula y obsesionado con los sombreros que era Terry Pratchett.

¿Cómo se puede ser multimillonario y seguir madrugando para ir a trabajar? Cosas que me iba preguntando según avanzaba este libro y descubriendo a una persona realmente peculiar, irónica y seria al mismo tiempo, irreverente y genial.

Es cierto, me hubiera gustado que Rob Wilkins no fuera un narrador tan implicado en la biografía. Como ayudante del autor durante tantos años lo conocía mejor que la mayoría, pero me pareció triste que no dejara más espacio para otras voces (como las de su mujer e hija que se mencionan bastante poco en le libro, ni tan siquiera al final). Por otro lado se nota muchísimo que Wilkins no era solo su ayudante, también creo que era su fan (obsesivo) número 1.

De todas maneras y más allá de que a veces el autor de la biografía se me hiciera un poco cargante, el libro es un imprescindible para todo fan de Terry Pratchett, para descubrirlo detrás de sus personajes y sorprenderse por esa vida que lo llevó desde su infancia humilde, el poco aprecio de sus profesores, su trabajo como periodista a el éxito más absoluto como novelista.

Una biografía con la que he reído y sí, llorado, pero lo que más agradezco es las ganas locas que me ha dejado de seguir leyendo a Terry Pratchett, y releyéndolo... por mucho tiempo.

I had to take a star off my rating, because the main character dies. Surely a mistake.

With the familiarity of deep friendship, and obvious respect, Rob Wilkins shares with us Sir Terry's irascible views, easily kindled curiosity, and unfailing satisfaction with tinkering. the biography is told with a deft hand, never hiding the fact that this is *not* being written as an unbiased account of a literary figure. It is instead a loving reminiscence of a life lived large.

Mind how you go.

The cover GR is showing is NOT this book's actual cover; this is:

And yes, it's the signed edition of a limited number. It also received special binding and the following additions: a postcard with a TP doodle and one of the most famous quote from the Discworld series, a doodle by Rob Wilkins, TP's gilded sigil (the honeybee) and more.

Sir Terry is the famous author of the Discworld series (and more). In December 2007, he was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's of all things. It seems especially ironic and tragic that he had this particular illness what with him being a writer, his calling being bringing to life strange worlds and people, living in his own head so to speak - when it is his mind that was to fail him before his body would.

It is therefore no surprise that it was around that time (December 2007) when the idea of writing an autobiography actually took shape (he had always dismissed it before). Sir Terry even started jutting down quite a bit from which Rob Wilkins was taking cues here and there for this book.

People knowing Pratchett and his works also know that Wilkins has been working for and living with the Pratchetts for years, before the diagnosis even. They had a kind of symbiosis going and it shows in this book.

Not only is the biography written with snark and wit, the reader gets to see events through the eyes of TP as well as Wilkins, thereby affording a more wholesome reading experience.

This edition also features a number of photographs, some showing scribbles or notes or sketches and some old ones taken by the family. Here are some of them that nicely show Sir Terry, the author, the husband, father, boss, friend and nerd/geek.

I loved learning about the author's days in school - thereby getting quite the history lesson, too - and of his struggles before he became an avid reader. Equally, I was delighted to meet all the other family members and discovering quite a number of people who seemed intrinsically familiar ... because they definitely were the inspiration for certain people on Discworld! :D However, his years spent as a journalist of one sort or another and the people he thereby met was quite astonishing as well.

Flabbergastingly, there were also quite some history lessons in this book. I, for example, had not known there was a nuclear incident scaled 5-out-of-7 in Pennsylvania in the 70s (as a European, I mostly heard about Chernobyl and the much later incident at Fukushima but not much else). It’s this kind of added value that make this shine even brighter.

Most of all, though, it was as lovely as it was sometimes surprising to take such an intimate look at Sir Terry and his loved ones, how they experienced certain milestones and forged a good life together. Surprising because one has a certain idea about a person that is never complete and the truth is sometimes, well, surprising. *lol*
Then, of course, we come to his writing career and just knowing where certain details came from … like the bees … *tears up*

Possibly, it will never not be difficult reading about TP or reading one of his books (I often end up in tears) but this was also balm for the soul and kinda gave me a weird form of closure. Moreover, I will re-read the entire Discworld series now that the new audiobooks are almost all released (the last few will become available within the year) so this was a good start to the re-read before I'm a ball of emotions again.

#SpeakHisName

P.S.: For anyone wondering, yes, there are quite a number of (glorious) footnotes.

I enjoyed this biography in the spirit that it was offered. It is the record of a well known author as told by his personal assistant and friend. To his credit, it isn't completely glowing. He manages to show us an impatient man whose writing was fueled in large part by anger. Someone who was unintentionally cruel (or maybe it was intended?) But also a man who valued practical skills (and some impractical ones). A man who loved cats and tortoises, kept bees, and raised sheep. Wilkins also declares that Pratchett was the most firmly married man of all time.

There are lots of facts, many culled from the unfinished autobiography that Pratchett was dictating during his last years, plus copious anecdotes that the omnipresent PA recalled. Given the nature of their professional relationship and friendship, there is also a small element of memoir on Wilkins part too. As promised in the subtitle of the book, there are copious footnotes. These are not academic references, but more like those of the Discworld novels—further comments of the author on the event in the text. Indeed there is no bibliography, so if you are in search of analysis you will be disappointed.

The final chapters of the book and of Pratchett's life are incredibly sad. Dementia is a cruel disease that chips away at a person until a mere shell is left. It's distressing and fear producing for the patient and painful and worrying for their family and friends. This, for me, was the primary message to pay attention to in this volume.

I have no doubt that other books will analyze Pratchett's contributions to culture and literature, but this is the fond remembrance of a close associate and friend.

“No one is finally dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away—until the clock he wound up winds down, until the wine she made has finished its ferment, until the crop they planted is harvested. The span of someone’s life is only the core of their actual existence.”
— Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett (1948-2015)

This official biography is a delightful and devastating work of love by Rob Wilkins, Terry’s former personal assistant, who started out as a fan and became a friend, business manager, and is now head of the Pratchett literary estate. A Life with Footnotes shines with the familiarity of deep friendship and obvious respect and affection—Terry and Rob were so close for so many years that they even shared a Twitter account, and Rob was in the unique position to be there for the writing of many books, the embuggerance of Terry’s Alzheimer’s, and the bitter, bitter end.

“Only seventeen, Terry has already latched on to the idea of adopting received and dusty storytelling formalities, perking them up by instantly undermining them, and then arranging for the whole fantastical set-up to be involved in a head-on collision with the modern world in all its colloquial glory.”

Before his death, Terry was working on an autobiography, which was never completed—but contrary to the hard-drive containing all of his unpublished fiction, which, in accordance with his final wishes, was ritually destroyed by a steamroller, Rob took it upon himself to finish what Terry had started. He draws largely from Terry’s unfinished manuscript, but also from the stories of friends, family, and former colleagues… and if you thought that it wouldn’t be all that interesting until Terry becomes the beloved, bestselling author we all think of him as, then you would be very wrong. He lived a life filled with astonishing achievements in a variety of jobs, and had some peculiar hobbies and interests, ranging from electrical engineering, to beekeeping, gaming, rescuing tortoises, gardening, and casting insects in gold and silver. Always one with an inquisitive mind and easily kindled curiosity, Terry insisted on forging his own sword after being knighted for services to literature. It’s all illuminating, and I appreciated that Rob didn’t try to sugarcoat or hide Terry’s more disagreeable personality traits, such as his irascibility and ingratitude, but there were also many sweet, and even more funny passages. The book turns truly exceptional in the solemn final third though—right around when Terry starts exhibiting some worrying symptoms, which culminated in an earth-shattering diagnosis of Posterior Cortical Atrophy, a rare, visual variant of Alzheimer’s disease.

“I heard Terry call up: ‘Come on, what have you done with it?’ I went down to him. ‘What have I done with what?’ He was staring directly down at his keyboard. ‘The “S”. You’ve taken the “S”. Where is it?’ I was mystified. I went and stood beside him and looked. The letter S was on the keyboard, in between the letters A and D, as usual. I leaned forward and punched it. He looked at me and held my gaze. There was anxiety in his eyes. How frightening that must have been for him—his known world suddenly and inexplicably not making sense, utterly disorienting signals emanating from his computer keyboard, of all the familiar places.“

The diagnosis and everything that followed: The anguish, the helplessness, the race against time, the advocacy for dying with dignity, the ultimate decline—Rob was right there in the room with Terry through it all, and it is heart-wrenching to read. Once Terry could no longer get through public appearances by himself, they became, by necessity, a double act, and Terry would refer to Rob as “the keeper of the anecdote”—other than Terry himself, no one else could have done this project justice. Love poured off every page, and when I finished it, I wept and wept and wept—for the cruel hand Terry was dealt much too soon, the strength with which he faced the inevitable, the people he left behind, and the stories the world will now never get to read… but I also wept out of gratitude for the many, many stories he did get to share, and which will live on.

“He told me about a dream he had had about us both. ‘You were standing behind me,’ Terry said, ‘and my brain was made of grey sand. And you were trying to hold it all together, but this grey sand was slipping through your fingers, and you couldn’t.’ Trying to hold on to Terry’s brain as it slipped inexorably through my fingers… that was exactly what these months felt like. (…) The book nudged forward by degrees, painfully slowly. But every day that Terry stuck at it was another day that Terry was still a writer. And every day that Terry was still a writer was another day that Terry was still alive. So we stuck at it.“

A Life with Footnotes is a magnificent, deeply moving, heartwarming, and intimate portrait of a treasure of a writer we were robbed of much too soon; it never pretends to be an unbiased account of an iconic literary figure, but is, rather proudly, a witty, loving, very human reminiscence of a life well-lived, albeit cruelly cut short, told with a deft hand, funny anecdotes, and many, many footnotes. I felt privileged to be granted these insights, and this work does a great service to Terry’s legacy; it’s the best Pratchett book not written by the man himself. GNU Sir Terry, and thank you Rob for sharing him with us.

This book is a wonderful insight into the life and mind of the late Sir Terry Pratchett. We follow his whole life story, through early years as a reporter onto his highly successful Discworld writing and ending with, well, The End. The author Rob Wilkins worked very closely with Pratchett for many years and it was wonderful reading his views and insights, and this, combined with quotes and notes from Terry himself in years past, really help deliver a personal experience. Reading this often felt like being in the room with the pair of them, so much so that I felt I should offer them a drink when pausing to make a cuppa.

This isn't a new novel. This isn't some crazy story of wild adventures. This is a chance to learn more about Sir Terry; about his books, about his writing processes, and about facing a looming darkness. Yes parts of it are sad, but it's also heartwarming and funny and thoroughly interesting throughout.

For any Pratchett fans this is an absolute must.

Terry Pratchett was a true library lover and wrote, “it seemed to be that just being inside a library was nearly enough, as if everything in the books would permeate your skin by some kind of osmosis.” As a lad, he hung out at Beaconsfield Library and “found himself incorporated into the library workforce as a Saturday boy.” He worked at reshelving and repairing books on a voluntary basis. In return, the unspoken agreement was that he could borrow an unlimited number of books from the library.

As a fellow lover of fantasy literature, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s books in particular, I love that, “If The Wind in the Willows was one harp-pluck moment in the movie of Terry’s life, then The Lord of the Rings was another, with perhaps the harp plucked even more firmly.” He regarded “The Lord of the Rings as right up there among the greatest achievements of humanity.”

Talking of humanity, I loved reading that his wife “Lyn’s strongest and most abiding first impression of Terry was of his kindness.”

It was touching to read of Terry’s friendships, and how he was affected by the death of Douglas Adams, whose books were important to him. “In 1983, when a reviewer in Asimov’s Science Fiction magazine declared The Colour of Magic the funniest thing he had ever read, Terry’s response was, ‘He couldn’t have read The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, then.’”

It was fun reading about the Discworld Conventions. At one in Liverpool, “the available food included what was widely agreed to have been one of the last servings of that dying culinary phenomenon, the Great British Curry, complete with obligatory sultanas, and there was something jelly-based for pudding.”

Next, I learned that, “Terry used to describe himself as ‘horizontally wealthy,” meaning that money hadn’t changed the person that he was, he could just afford to buy more things. However, he made some interesting choices, “instead of a Delorean DMC-12, Terry bought a shepherd’s hut,” which is “where [he] had the idea for the character of Tiffany Aching.”

Then, I grinned at how then British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, served Terry tea and biscuits in the Cabinet Office after he had submitted a petition on behalf of the Alzheimer’s Research Trust for more funding for research into dementia.

Next, I marveled at the Ode to Sir Terry Pratchett from Sir David Jason, which as just lovely and included a closing line that was reminiscent of how the Two Ronnies would close each episode of their comedy television show.

Along the way, I learned a new word, tracklement, which means savory condiment. The sentence from the book reads, “He brought a picnic lunch: Scotch eggs, pork pies, tracklements….” I imagine one of the tracklements was Branston pickle, another might have been a chunky chutney.

And I listened to some music that was new to me after reading that Neil Gaiman was singing “the first lines of ‘Shoehorn with Teeth’ – his and Terry’s favourite They Might Be Giants song.”

All in all it was a lovely read where I learned more about Terry’s world, enjoyed some nostalgic moments and gained some insights into the Disc World stories I love so much.

Starts slow, and somewhat off for me, as I had to adjust my image of Terry Pratchett with the author's extensive experience of same ;) One thing's for sure, Wilkins is not sugar-coating things - he respects - and knew - Pratchett well enough not to even hint at lionizing him, and for that he has my respect. Does it make the book harder to read? Yep, absolutely. But in the end, it's also absolutely worth it.
Full RTC

4.5 stars

Superb. Highly recommended.

could not imagine a better biography for sir terry. could not imagine a better biography, period?
i'm hoping i'll be able to persuade my sister (who's never touched a discworld book in her life) to read this, and not even because i want her to somehow magically understand what pratchett's writing means to me - even if i did, that's arguably not within this book's scope - but because i think it is, for want of a better word, a story well told.

it's the story of terry pratchett, yes, and his working class upbringing, his teenage love of sci-fi, and a parade of writing gigs (in local journalism and PR) that somehow eventually led to him becoming UK's bestselling author and national treasure. there are funny anecdotes and celebrity cameos and thwarted movie deals and the whole knighthood thing - the kinds of things you'd expect to be covered by a wikipedia article (if a staggeringly well-sourced one).
but then there's also rob wilkins, and his authorial voice, and his place in terry's life.

on the face of it, a PA writing about their deceased famous employer might seem like one of those blatant cashgrabs in the vein of "lady di's former hairdresser tells all: the true face of the people's princess!!". within just a dozen of pages of A Life With Footnotes, however, the mere idea becomes laughable. it becomes very clear very quickly that rob wilkins was in fact terry pratchett's friend. and so the story becomes not "a biographer writing about a beloved author" but "a person lovingly tracing back the past of someone who was as close as family (and often just as exasperating) and trying to come to terms with losing them much to soon, and in a terribly painful way".
because as interesting and well-written the bulk of this biography undeniably is, it's the final 100 pages or so that make the book what it is, that inform the reader why wilkins probably felt that this was a story that needed to be told. terry's years' long battle with - and eventual passing from - a rare form of alzheimer's is a fact well-known to all his fans, but to read about it from the point of view of someone who was there for it all, and who has so keenly and personally felt this loss, is genuinely devastating.

one of my favourite parts of the first half of the book is how carefully wilkins recounts seemingly unimportant details - a tyranical boss at a local paper, an obsession with maintaining greenhouses, a phase of being weirdly into CB radio, teenage purchases of barely fuctional mopeds...all this does not paint the picture of terry pratchett, twinkly-eyed bearded gent with a fedora, but it does create a portrayal which loudly proclaims "this person was important to me. their hobbies and foibles and weird quirks are worthy of recording. their life is worthy of remembering and cherishing, even if to the rest of the world it seems unextraordinary." later on, of course, there are the dizzying heights of success and the global recognition, and that is all par for the course in a terry pratchett biography. but i think that the reason those last twenty pages or so made me cry uncontrollably wasn't that terry was a great author, and that losing his writing was a terrible shame (though of course it was). it wasn't even that terry was a great man, because god knows that within the pages of this book we find that for all his kindness he was also at times quite petty and abrupt. no, it was that rob wilkins had to watch as a terrible illness took from one of his closest friends what he loved best, and what he felt defined him, and he could do nothing about it. and i feel like this biography is rob wilkins giving a little bit of his friend back to the world. "a man is not dead while his name is still spoken". a whole life, with all its connections and echoes, is not gone just because the person who had lived it isn't here anymore.
a little bit of terry might still live in all of us who love and know his stories, but the bulk resides in those who loved and knew *him*, and A Life With Footnotes somehow bridges this gap for its readers. truly cannot recommend this wonderful book enough.

Should be more than 5 stars.

I'll admit that I wept when I heard Terry Pratchett had died. I didn't know him. I'd never met him. I had little knowledge of his wellbeing since the announcement that he had a rare form of Alzheimer's had been announced. But I had read almost everything he wrote and I loved him for it. So I wept because I knew there'd be no more.

I got the audio version of the book partly because I knew I'd never be able to get through it without crying (and it's hard to read with tears all over your tablet) but also because it was read (very beautifully) by the author, Rob Wilkins (Terry's personal assistant).

And what a job he's done. Terry had begun making notes for an autobiography but sadly did not live long enough to write it. In his absence Rob Wilkins has done an absolutely marvellous job of telling Terry's life story from his childhood when he didn't enjoy reading to the powerhouse who regularly gave us two sublime books a year.

If you are not a fan of the Discworld then you may not appreciate all the references made to the books but even as an autobiography of one of the UK's best selling and prolific authors, this is an extremely well written, thoughtful and very personal look at Terry Pratchett's remarkable life and work.

So I thank you Rob for this wonderful book. I wept at the beginning. I wept at the end. I cried for all the characters I'll miss and those I never got to meet.
Everyone who is a Discworld fan has their favourite character. I have too many to mention but I'd like to mention The Luggage because that is the point (in the very first Discworld "The Colour of Magic") that I fell in love with all things Pratchett.

Thankyou Sir Terry and thankyou Rob Wilkins.

Update: druhé čtení
Ten příval emocí byl na podruhé snad ještě intenzivnější.

Některý knihy mají tu sílu najít si k vám cestu, i když jste se ani neobtěžovali podívat se jejich směrem. Neplánovala jsem a nečekala na první výtisky v knihkupectví. Přesto se mi jeden z nich do rukou dostal. A abych neurazila zběsilé nadšení majitele onoho výtisku, nalistovala jsem si předmluvu a začala číst …

A co na ní bylo tak zvláštního, že jsem se nakonec pročetla až do konce? Cit, hořkosladkost, naděje a plno zlomených srdcí mezi řádky. O pár set stran později se k nim to moje přidalo.

Nejsem zbožňujícím fanouškem Terryho knih, nejsem ani občasným fanouškem Terryho knih. Sama sobě si neustále vemlouvám to, že jsem ho chytila za špatný konec. Naštěstí nejsem jediná, kdo se k tomuto názoru přiklání. Po Životě v poznámkách pod čarou si troufám tvrdit, že jsem zbožňující fanynkou obrovského srdcaře, který dýchal pro fantastiku do posledního dechu …

Díky Terry, naše cesta právě začíná.

”Ze všech mrtvých spisovatelů na světě, je Terry Pratchett ten nejživější.”

A must-read biography for one of the greatest writers to ever live.

I laughed out loud. I pondered deep thoughts.

And I cried, truly wept, when Rob wrote about Sir Terry’s illness and death.

Discworld became a lifeline to me when my own dad became ill and ultimately died in early 2023, and reading about Terry’s death felt a bit like losing my dad all over again. The frustration. The anxiety. The fear. The grief.

And yet - I am so glad I read this book. I learned so much about Terry, his family, and what made him tick. I gained new insight not only into Discworld but his other work as well, and I can’t wait to read that too, someday.

This is a truly wonderful book that I would recommend to any and all Discworld fans, of course, but also just people who want to read about a fascinating man.

Terry was a (admittedly imperfect) treasure, and I’m so glad he shared his imagination with us.

Thank you, Terry, for your books.

(And as Terry would always respond: “Thank YOU for your money!”)

A biography of somebody whose books meant a lot to me throughout, whose illness and death still makes me sad to think about (and always will, I expect, as long as my mind works.)

Bittersweet, just as expected. Glorious in parts, but also, oddly, a bit uneven towards the last.

It seems that this book picks up on Pratchett's own notes for his own autobiography, edited and expounded and for the first half of the book that works splendidly. It is clear from this book how many very good editors Pratchett had and this biography is also so well put together, moving fast and funny, with of course the footnotes.

The last chapters which I expected would be the more devastating were ones where, unexpectedly (perversely?) I found myself disconnecting a bit. They are perhaps more Rob, and obviously a devastating period. But it heavier at describing all kinds of media appearances and documentaries they (Wilkins along with Terry Pratchett) did, all the focus movie adaptations, and there is almost a kind of chronological zigzagging around. Naming tons and tons of (presumably) celebrities (I had no idea who many of them were). (But so very little insight into say, Lyn besides her famous lemon drizzle cake. Maybe an inherent "problem" of authorized official biographies, respecting the wishes of ones who do not want to be a part of the story).

There is a dichotomy underlying this about Terry the person, the Terry Pratchett the "nauthor" and Rob Wilkins comes into this story as a superfan of Terry the nauthor and later his PA, and the person who helped in his later life in so many of his "nauthor" activities, like writing books and being Terry Pratchett the nauthor. I think I missed a bit a sense of Terry the person, and how being Terry Pratchett the nauthor was taking, if it was, from Terry the person particularly at the end.

This made me think also a bit (as much as I have been able to think, recovering from a cold) about being a fan and how many different ways there are of being one. Rob and many of the fans in this book are very big, fans in a way (collectibles, movie adaptations, loving every new book and new direction) that is much more earnest, loyal, committed than my way of being a fan when I call myself a fan of something. (I would call myself a fan, but maybe other fans would think I am not a proper fan? I got Raising Steam, I have not read it yet, I am not sure if I ever will. I have read Snuff and maybe I would erase it from my mind if I could. I might not be proper fan material). And there is this odd balance towards the ending, Rob writes as a friend but also as a fan (writing to other fans?) and all while being the biographer and that somehow felt a bit off balance. Still, it is a precious testimony and I am glad I read it. Even if I am probably not proper fan material (and not regretting that or wishing to change it, just warning others of my own bias).

(3,5/5)

Ressenya publicada originalment a El Biblionauta

Tot sovint, això de ressenyar és una cosa estranya: una part té a veure amb la necessitat d’explicar un llibre de la manera més objectiva possible, i en aquesta tasca hi intervenen els recursos teòrics i la capacitat d’anàlisi de qui escriu la ressenya, a més d’un grau més o menys important de perspicàcia. Aquesta és la part tècnica, per posar-li una etiqueta. D’altra banda, com a ressenyadors d’un mitjà popular (en oposició a «acadèmic»), també pot tenir importància descriure l’experiència subjectiva de llegir el llibre i això, amics i amigues, no depèn tant del llibre en si com d’una sèrie de factors externs que recorren un ventall inacabable d’elements que van des de la son que tenies quan llegies fins a les teves expectatives (sempre injustes) en agafar el llibre, per esmentar-ne dues. Si la part objectiva i la part subjectiva estan alineades, per bé o per mal, tot flueix i la ressenya pot traspuar entusiasme per la lectura realitzada o, de vegades, tot el contrari. Quan no estan alineades, la sensació que predomina és la frustració. Aquest és el meu cas amb Terry Pratchett: Una vida amb notes a peu de pàgina: és un llibre important, commovedor, informatiu, amb un to distès que agradarà als aficionats a Terry Pratchett i, tanmateix, per una barreja d’expectatives (sempre injustes, ja ho he dit) i una falta de connexió personal amb la veu d’autor de Rob Wilkins, m’ha resultat frustrant. A veure si ho sé explicar essent just amb un llibre que és un afegit imprescindible als prestatges de tots aquells qui admirem l’obra d’en Terry Pratchett.

En realitat, aquest llibre recull i encarna un llegat: el d’en Terry Pratchett a en Rob Wilkins (el seu secretari personal durant quinze anys, al llarg dels quals la seva relació va estretir-se i donar pas a l’amistat), en forma de records, anècdotes i notes que el seu amic i assistent personal hi ha modelat en forma de llibre. En aquest sentit, és un acte d’amor preciós, que aconsegueix dibuixar un personatge emotiu a través de la mirada d’en Wilkins. És, també, un acte de generositat amb tots nosaltres, que complementa de forma tendra (i, de vegades, corprenedora) els textos de ficció pels que la majoria de nosaltres coneixíem Pratchett. Certament no és exactament un text adulador, i no són estranys els moments del text en què el retrat provoca certa antipatia, però sempre queda clara l’admiració del biògraf cap al creador del Discmón. Encara que jo hagués gaudit més d’un text més crític, una biografia un punt més formal, tinc clar que no és aquest el tipus de llibre que en Wilkins volia escriure. Fins i tot, potser, no era el tipus de llibre que havia d’escriure. El retrat de Pratchett que aflora, a poc a poc, a mesura que es desplega el text, és el d’una persona tan imperfecta com qualsevol de nosaltres, ple de petites peculiaritats, no desproveït de vanitat, però també genial, propera i pendent del seu entorn i de la seva gent. Sap reflectir, també, la gran i sovint incontrolable creativitat de l’autor. Sap acumular, en definitiva, tot de petits aspectes que fan encara més dolorosa la progressiva destrucció provocada per l’Alzheimer. Rob Wilkins, deia abans, va ser secretari personal de Terry Pratchett durant quinze anys, i durant els darrers vuit va viure el declivi del seu patró i amic. Es va guanyar el dret a la nostàlgia, i el to del llibre s’estableix des del primer paràgraf: confesso que vaig haver de reprimir una llàgrima amb la darrera carta d’en Pratchett a en Rob Wilkins.

El llibre, que arriba a les nostres mans com a «biografia oficial», fa un plantejament cronològic estructurant al voltant d’anècdotes concretes que permeten albirar la personalitat d’en Pratchett al mateix temps que estableix les seves principals fites biogràfiques: infància, estudis, feina, matrimoni, naixement de la seva filla… Cada capítol té un títol en tres temps que referencien, una mica en clau d’enigma, triades d’esdeveniments importants de cada període i estan farcits de testimonis (el nucli familiar, antics companys de feina, escriptors —a mi em feia molta il·lusió veure-hi aparèixer en Neil Gaiman!). Una de les principals fonts d’informació del llibre —i la que el fa especial— són les notes vitals que el mateix Pratchett va deixar escrites, en previsió d’una futura biografia que no va poder escriure. A partir d’aquestes informacions, i amarant el text dels seus records personals, en Rob Wilkins ha escrit un text de to proper que, si el llegíssim en veu alta, faria pensar en una reunió de coneguts que es troben per parlar, amb afecte, d’un amic que els ha deixat. És un text cuidat que la Marta Armengol Royo ha sabut traslladar al català preservant-ne l’emotivitat d’en Wilkins i un humor controlat que l’impregna. Paga la pena esmentar, en un text farcit de notes a peu de pàgina fins i tot a la coberta, l’apèndix afegit per la traductora, a on «dialoga» amb la traducció al castellà d’en Manu Viciano. Per mi —no tothom hi estarà d’acord— és una metàfora del que simbolitza en Pratchett (i potser altres autors i autores de literatura popular de qualitat): un autor que ens pertany a tots, que forma part de la nostra vida i que no podem evitar compartir amb entusiasme i afecte. És possible que jo hagi tingut problemes per connectar amb aquesta dimensió més emocional i personal d’en Wilkins —ha estat una espina incòmoda de la qual no m’he pogut desempallegar—, que em porta a retreure-li una falta de formalitat que, per mi, augmentaria la seva eficàcia com a document biogràfic d’interès per a un públic més general. Al mateix temps, però, li donen un caràcter especial al text que el farà més interessant pel reducte (enorme, d’altra banda) de fans de l’autor.

El llibre parla de moltes coses, i algunes d’elles queden gravades a la memòria. A la meva selecció personal destaca la relació d’en Pratchett amb el món de les convencions i el fandom, tant com a adolescent i jove adult que encara no havia publicat com, més endavant, com a autor fulgurant amb un volum creixent d’admiradors. De fet, la transició de fan a autor està molt ben recollida, i la velocitat amb la qual la seva professionalització com a escriptor pren embranzida és astoradora. M’ha interessat conèixer la relació entre Terry Pratchett i l’escriptor de ciència-ficció i crític del gènere David Langford, i m’agradaria saber més de com la constant comunicació entre ambdós personatges va ajudar a modelar la carrera d’en Pratchett. També m’ha agradat comprovar com de ràpid (a Ritus Iguals, la tercera novel·la!) apareix l’interès de l’autor per explorar i subvertir qüestions socials com els rols de gènere. Menys afalagador, però certament honest, és comprovar la poca tolerància a la frustració de l’escriptor quan era candidat a un premi i no quedava en primer lloc. Els moments en què fa aparició el declivi provocat per la seva malaltia, és clar, són corprenedors. A poc a poc, la successió d’anècdotes dibuixa una imatge d’en Pratchett amb clarobscurs —més aviat amables—, i a mesura que això va passant, per a mi guanya en interès. Una cosa divertida de la biografia, si hi poses una mica de mala fe nostrada (us miro a vosaltres, Mai Més Llibres! Però perquèus estimo molt…) és quan expliquen la irritació d’en Pratchett quan els seus llibres, als EE.UU., es van publicar… ehem… desendreçats… Val a dir que crec que la proposta d’ordenació dels llibres de Discmón que proposa Mai Més és encertadíssima.

També vull comentar la cura amb la qual Mai Més ha elaborat l’edició del llibre, amb tapa dura, llom cosit i paper de qualitat. És un d’aquells llibres que no vols deixar anar i que t’acullen com una manta pesant a l’hivern. És un objecte preciós, per col·leccionar, per regalar, i part del mèrit és de la preciosa coberta dissenyada i il·lustrada per la Marina Vidal, a partir d’una silueta que em suggereix l’autor tal com l’havíem conegut fins ara: a partir de la silueta que delimiten les seves creacions i la seva imaginació. La tasca que està fent Mai Més amb els llibres de Discmón és una meravella destinada a perdurar, i aquesta biografia n’és el complement perfecte. Si m’ho pregunteu, crec que per endinsar-se en la peculiaritat de la creativitat d’en Terry Pratchett, i per conèixer la genialitat de la seva imaginació, les novel·les són millor porta d’entrada i que, en realitat, aporten una informació més indirecta però més autèntica. Ara bé, un cop siguem captius del seu món (i ho serem, inevitablement), aquesta biografia és un document imprescindible per a contextualitzar la resta de la seva obra, a més de ser una lectura apassionant que ens emocionarà i afectarà a parts iguals. El fet d’haver llegit aquest llibre modifica la nostra percepció dels llibres de Discmón? Doncs val a dir que, en el meu cas, una mica sí. Aquesta Una Vida amb Notes a Peu de Pàgina ens mostra un ésser humà imperfecte, com ho som tots: com ho són, de fet, tots els personatges que viuen a les pàgines del Discmón. I, d’alguna manera, les seves novel·les ens ensenyen que l’única resposta a la imperfecció és la compassió entre iguals. Ara veig les històries de Discmón com a una creació que supera els límits del seu creador, i això, al capdavall, és la marca de les veritables obres d’art.

I've read 30+ of Terry Pratchett's 50+ books, but I didn't know very much about his life before reading this biography. I never had the pleasure of hearing him speak at a convention, or of seeing him at a signing, despite the extensive amount of touring he did from the mid-90s to the 2010s. This extensive biography was written by his long time assistant, friend, and collaborator Rob Wilkins, a huge Pratchett fan who went from working on organizing the UK Discworld conventions to working for Pratchett's agent to working for the author himself. It's funny and conversational, full of footnotes and silly asides, not unlike a Pratchett book in that regard. It takes nearly 90 pages to get through Pratchett's high school years; though to be fair, Pratchett published his first two short stories, bought his first typewriter, and attended his first few sci-fi conventions before he was out of high school. He was a tremendously dedicated worker, often writing two or more books a year once he quit his journalism and PR jobs to begin writing full time. This book is primarily about his creative work and extensive hobbies (gardening, beekeeping, raising goats and ducks, astronomy, silver-casting, brewing mead, building home electronics, playing computer games, forging his own sword) but skates lightly over his interpersonal relationships outside of professional collaborations. I did not leave it with a good sense of how his only daughter might have felt about having such a workaholic as a father, but I did leave it with a better sense of what fed and nourished his astonishing imagination, and the successes and stumbling blocks he met along the way.

found this biography very interesting and learnt alot more about the author and his life growing up and his journey with discworld. Rob has done a good collating things together

Avis Lecture 🧐📖 "Terry Pratchett, Une vie avec notes de bas de page", La Biographie officielle, Rob Wilkins, L'Atalante ✨☄️ @edlatalante
Ouvrage reçu en Service Presse 🤩

"Personne n'est finalement mort jusqu'à ce que les ondulations qu'il provoque dans le monde disparaissent." Terry Pratchett

Je ne lis pas beaucoup de biographie donc mon avis n'est peut être pas le plus objectif ou le plus "critique" mais qu'importe ! Quand on aime un auteur à ce point, l'objectivité importe peu 😅
Et sans surprise, j'ai adoré cette biographie !

Terry Pratchett est peut être l'un des plus grands génies de l'imaginaire de notre temps. Son rapport à la vie, à la mort m'a toujours fasciné et j'ai adoré découvrir l'auteur au fil de sa vie, qui nous est retranscrite ici par Rob Wilkins.
Mais qui est Rob Wilkins ?
À la recherche d'une secrétaire, d'une "femme du village" pour l'aider dans ses tâches quotidiennes et gérer le flot de courrier etc, Terry Pratchett va finalement se retrouver avec Rob. C'est lui qui au fil des pages va nous livrer des morceaux de vie de l'auteur, qui travaillait déjà sur une autobiographie. J'ai trouvé très touchant de voir leur relation de travail évoluer pour finalement se transformer en amitié.
De son enfance à sa mort, on découvre l'homme au delà du phénomène. Car si la notoriété de Pratchett n'est plus à débattre, ce livre nous donne un aperçu de l'image de l'auteur en Angleterre où il est véritablement adulé comme une star, même après sa mort.

J'ai l'impression d'être plus proche du personnage, d'adhérer encore plus au Disque Monde (je ne pensais pas cela possible ! 🤣🥰).
En bref, c'est pour moi un must read pour les fans de la série, mais surtout pour ceux qui ont réussi à percevoir l'auteur au travers de ses mots.
Je reste très admiratif de l'auteur, encore plus aujourd'hui après avoir terminé cette biographie.

Son esprit fin, critique, caricaturant nos sociétés avec brio et HUMOUR ; humour jusqu'à rire de La Mort, manque profondément au monde. Il nous laisse son travail d'une vie, son Disque-Monde, dont les ondulations ne sont pas prêtes de disparaitre...☄️

Y-a-t-il des lecteurs du Disque Monde ici ?

A perfect biography, from the only person who could have written it.

Yes, there were tears. I was fine through most of it; I was most touched by the portions surrounding the early days of Discworld publishing as I put it in the context of my own experience. I feel blessed to have come into The Colour of Magic the same year it was released in paperback, at age 10. As the final book chapters delved into the increasing burdens of his posterior cortical atrophy, I was merely melancholy. What finally got me was the account of Neil Gaiman's last social visit with Terry, in which Terry was not responding, until Neil started singing their favourite shared song, and Terry joined in and they had a marvelous time reminiscing from that point. After that, I think I cried more than when my mother died. (Memories of my mother are permanently tied to my Discworld experience. She bought me that original paperback, simply thinking it was something I might enjoy. Thanks, mom.)

A must for long time Discworld readers. It expands on everything we already knew about the man and will inevitably provide small surprises, new framings, and will absolutely enhance your future Discworld experiences.

“Who would want to read a book that is suitable for you? Not me, for one. I wanted the unsuitable books.” - Terry Pratchett

…I feel exactly the same, but I can say that as a ticket to uncovering the life of one of the UK’s best loved writers, this book is absolutely suitable.

A truly wonderful and heartbreaking tale, filled with memories typed by Pratchett himself and lovingly woven with those of writer and ‘best PA in the world’ (read the book), Rob Wilkins. The unique humour and storytelling that carries you along in all of the adventure’s in Prattchett’s fiction is present throughout this biography which is filled with characters and situations as colourful and as rich as those from his books, making this a really enjoyable read.

I received a proof copy of this publication to review and I’m so pleased to have learnt more about this important writer and his contributions to literature. After I finished this book all I wanted to do was disappear into his work and into the worlds Pratchett left behind for us. So that’s where I’ll be for the next few months and after that I’ll probably be working through all the writers that inspired a teenage Terry Pratchett to put pen to paper in the first place.

I love Terry Pratchett's books. I've read my way through his works and own most of them, so it should come as no surprise that he's one of my favourite authors. I eat up his sharply funny, astonishingly witty prose and his unapologetic, merciless social commentary. Sam Vimes is one of my favourite fictional characters EVER, and Granny Weatherwax isn't far behind. I cried like a baby when I read The Shepherd's Crown, and not because of the major character death that occurs in it, but also because everyone knew at that point that there wouldn't be anything else after that final page. That was it, and it was a hard pill to swallow even for us who never met Sir Terry and knew him only through his work.

This biography was written by someone who knew him personally, and I must say it was by far the best biography I've ever read.

Written by Rob Wilkins, who was Pratchett's personal assistant and right-hand man for many years, it is obviously a labour of love that must have taken a chunk out of Wilkins. He describes Pratchett's less than glamorous childhood and youth vividly and interestingly, but I must say that the best part of the book starts when Pratchett hires him and he becomes a first-hand witness in the life of the force of nature that was his employer. The respect and love he felt for Pratchett comes through loud and clear on every page, but he also doesn't shy away from the less than perfect aspects of Pratchett's acerbic personality or beat around the bush when it comes to that terrible diagnosis and the heartbreaking decline we see in the last third of the book.

In addition to a whole bunch of amusing and less than amusing key events in Pratchett's life, the biography also includes a jaw-dropping amount of stuff I never knew before. For example, it suddenly became abundantly clear to me why Tiffany Aching lives where she does, and good heavens, I had no idea Pratchett had a shepherd's hut that inspired the one in the books. I was so tempted to start reading The Wee Free Men again and continue until The Shepherd's Crown, but alas, my TBR list won't allow it right now. They're right there on my shelf, though, so maybe later.

We all know where this biography ends, unfortunately, but knowing still didn't make it any easier to read, and I must say I was really upset for some time after finishing this book. It's so bloody unfair that such a razor-sharp mind was struck by a degenerative condition you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. Still, Pratchett's legacy lives on, he won't be forgotten as long as people read Discworld, and we'd best be grateful that he was so prolific and so unrelentingly industrious about his work.

Thanks for everything, Sir Terry, and mind how you go.

Я не збиралась читати біографію Пратчетта, ще й не авто, але так склалися обставини, що цей красень хардбек продавався за фантастично смішні (😉) гроші. І слава богам Дискосвіту, бо виявився скарбом. Ще виявилось, що Роб Вілкінс - персональний асистент, друг, помічник, фанат - майстерний оповідач, а ця книга максимум концентрованої любові і відчаю, лист людини, яка стала свідком як величі так і поступового болючого згасання ментора, друга, генія, в полоні невиліковної, підступної хвороби, яка забирає спогади, виїдає тебе з середини. Роки життя з самого дитинства описані до найважливіших дрібниць. Приємно читати як з них народжувався письменник і як паралельно жила людина, з усіма перепитіями що зазвичай лишаються за кулісами. І кумедно від того як асистент копіює стиль автора (зноски, смішнявки, гачечки). І цікаво як по-різному дивиться близька людина з боку і як Террі описував себе і свій шлях в книзі автобіограф��чних есеїв Slip of the Keyboard. Також неймовірно надихає постійна праця і sheer joy невтомного письма та фонтануючих креативних ідей, до останніх місяців. Захват від того, як перетинались світи Геймана, Даля, Дугласа Адамса, і всіх-всіх. Гордість за здобутки, за визнання за життя. Відчуття урочистості, тепла. Світло і сум. Знімаю (уявного) капелюха.
#gnuterrypratchett

Amazing story of an extraordinary person, who gave us the magical Discworld. The life of sir Terry Pratchet

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“ …school was not about encouraging you to become something so much as it was about keeping you where you were, holding you in your allotted place…”

As described on the tin: a nicely written, and sometimes vaguely humorous, biography of Terry Pratchett.*

I have no more words.

GNU Terry Pratchett

*with copious footnotes.

This was a hard book to read. But one I felt I had to. Even if I didn't want to get to the ending, knowing where it was going, but knowing I must.

I don't know when I first heard of Terry Pratchett, or when I first landed on Discworld. That's lost to the sands of time, to the point that it feels like it's always been a part of my life. And once I was in, I could never leave again. You used to able to see your most read authors on here, but it was never a guess as to who number 1 was. I devoured every Discworld book, every adaptation. I have a tribute to Discworld tattooed all the way down one arm. It helped me look at the world in an entirely new way.

And at first reading this I was a little sad that it kind of skipped the start, where Discworld came from in more depth, why did he choose to write the books he did. But then I realise that while Discworld is Terry, Terry is far more than Discworld. And this showed me the rest, warts (but not on Granny) and all. Just the way he would have wanted. The 8th colour definitely left the world when he did, and we did not get him for as long as anyone wanted. But we got more of him than this world probably deserved, and the world is a better place for that. GNU Sir Pterry

"Only time and tears take away grief; that is what they are for."