Monday, February 07, 2011

DWQ Part 3

Part 3 of the Discworld Wedding Quotes project. This covers books 15 - 21 of the series: Men At Arms, Soul Music, Interesting Times, Maskerade, Feet Of Clay, Hogfather, and Jingo.

Men At Arms

“Sergeant Colon had been happily married for years, perhaps because he and his wife arranged their working lives so that they only met occasionally, normally on the doorstep.”

“It takes a very special and strong-minded kind of atheist to jump up and down with their hand clasped under their other armpit and shout, 'Oh, random fluctuations in the space-time continuum!' or 'Aaargh, primitive and outmoded concept on a crutch!'”

“She vaguely suspected that Carrot was trying to court her. But, instead of the usual flowers or chocolates, he seemed to be trying to gift-wrap a city.”

“As for Gaspode, he was resigning himself to a life without love, or at least any more than the practical affection experienced so far, which had consisted of an unsuspecting chihuahua and a brief liaison with a postman's leg.”

“The service itself was going to be performed by the Dean, who had carefully made one up; there was no official civil marriage service in Ankh-Morpork, other than something approximating to 'Oh, all right then, if you really must.'”

“'And the best man?'
'What?'
'The best man. You know? He hands you the ring and has to marry the bride if you run away and so on. The Dean's been reading up on it, haven't you, Dean?'
'Oh, yes,' said the Dean, who'd spent all the previous day with Lady Deidre Waggon's Book Of Etiquette. 'She's got to marry someone once she's turned up. You can't have unmarried brides flapping around the place, being a danger to society.'”

Soul Music
Strangely, I couldn't find anything at all in Soul Music.


Interesting Times

“It was, as always, a matter of protocol. Of discretion. Of careful etiquette. Of, ultimately, alcohol. Or at least the illusion of alcohol.”

Maskerade

“Of course, it was nothing but an old superstition and belonged to the unenlightened days when 'maiden' or 'mother' or ... the other one ... encompassed every woman over the age of twelve or so, except for maybe nine months of her life. These days, any girl bright enough to count and sensible enough to take Nanny's advice could put off being at least one of them for quite some time.”

“And pretty soon now young Mildred Tinker's mother would have a quiet word with Mildred Tinker's father, and he'd have a word with his friend Thatcher and he'd have a word with his son Hob, and then there'd be a wedding, all done in a properly civilised way except for maybe a black eye or two.”

“While kissing initially seemed to have more charms than cookery, a stolid Lancre lad looking for a bride would bear in mind his father's advice that kisses eventually lost their fire but cookery tended to get even better over the years, and direct his courting to those families that clearly showed a tradition of enjoying their food.”

“Agnes's life unrolled in front of her. It didn't look as thought it were going to have many high points. But it did hold years and years of being capable and having a lovely personality. It almost certainly held chocolate rather than sex and, while Agnes was not in a position to make a direct comparison, and regardless of the fact that a bar of chocolate could be made to last all day, it did not seem a very fair exchange.”

“Nanny enjoyed music, as well. If music were the food of love, she was game for a sonata and chips at any time.”

“They say that Queen Ezeriel of Klatch had a squint, but that didn't stop her having fourteen husbands, and that was only the official score.”


Feet Of Clay

“Good old Sybil - although she did tend to talk about curtains these days, but Sergeant Colon had said this happened to wives and was a biological thing and perfectly normal.”

“Words In The Heart Can Not Be Taken”


Hogfather
I couldn't find anything wedding-related in Hogfather, but I did like this computer-related one which resonates to any computer user who has been designated as their family's tech support...

“Hex worried Ponder Stibbons. He didn't know how it worked, but everyone else assumed that he did.”


Jingo

“'You will try to look dignified, won't you?' said Lady Sybil, adjusting his cloak.
'Yes, dear.'
'What will you try to look?'
'Dignified, dear.'
'And please try to be diplomatic.'
'Yes, dear.'
'What will you try to be?'
'Diplomatic, dear.'
'You're using your “henpecked” voice, Sam.'
'Yes, dear.'
'You know that's not fair.'”

“'Sam?'
Vimes looked up from his reading.
'Your soup will be cold,' said Lady Sybil from the far end of the table. 'You've been holding that spoonful in the air for the last five minutes by the clock.'
'Sorry, dear.'
Belatedly, his nuptial radar detected a certain chilliness from the far side of the cruet.
'Is, er, there something wrong, dear?' he said.
'Can you remember when we last had dinner together, Sam?'
'Tuesday, wasn't it?'
'That was the Guild of Merchants' annual dinner, Sam.'
Vimes's brow wrinkled. 'But you were there too, weren't you?'”

3 comments:

Jelliorum said...

Well, not sure how weddingy it is or how much backstory it might need, but I've always loved the quote when Carrot and Angua finally get together.

"She's shoved Gaspode out of the room:
"Angua?" said Carrot.
She turned.
"Don't say anything," she said. "And it might be all right."
After a while the bedsprings went glink.
And shortly after that, for Corpral Carrot, the Discworld moved. And it didn't even bother to stop to cancel the bread and newspapers."

I've always thought it was very sweet and simple.

By the way, great idea! Hope you manage to find a lovely way of incorporating Pratchett in your wedding. And thanks for sharing, too! :)

Brian Shanahan said...

I know this is late but I always liked this one from Soul Music

“Whatever happens, they say afterwards, it must have been Fate. People are always a little confused about this, as they are in the case of miracles. When someone is saved from certain death by a strange concatenation of circumstances, they say that's a miracle. But of course if someone is killed by a freak chain of events : the oil just spilled there, the safety fence just broke there : that must also be a miracle. Just because its not nice doesn't mean its not miraculous.”

Louise McMillan said...

Thank you so much for taking the time to find all these and post them, incredibly helpful of you. We're using 2 of Sybil/Vimes and 1 of Magrat/Nanny Ogg for our wedding next weekend.