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The Colour of Magic
Cover	[[Image:|thumb|center|200px|{{{1}}}]]
Published	November 1983
Publisher	Colin Smythe
ISBN	086140324X
Pages	288
Series	Rincewind Series
Main characters	Rincewind, Twoflower, the Luggage
Annotations	Annotations for The Colour of Magic
Notes	Book #01
All data relates to the UK hardback edition.

Blurb

On a world supported on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown), a gleeful, explosive, wickedly eccentric expedition sets out. There's an avaricious but inept wizard, a naive tourist whose luggage moves on hundreds of dear little legs, dragons who only exist if you believe in them, and of course THE EDGE of the planet ...

Cover

The cover illustration was drawn by Josh Kirby. Like most of his pictures the illustration is very busy and filled with a great number of details. It presumably shows a scene inside the tavern The Broken Drum. In the foreground of the picture the Luggage can be seen running away on several small feet. Notably, is the drawing of Twoflower running down the stairs. It can be seen that the artist decided to take a passage on page 16 literally where it says "(...) Blind Hugh began, and found himself looking up into a face with four eyes in it." However, the Terry Pratchett only wanted to state that Twoflower was wearing glasses.

Characters

Main characters

• Rincewind, and his Roundworld alias, Dr Rjinswand
• Twoflower, and his Roundworld alias, Jack Zweiblumen
• the Luggage
• Hrun, the Barbarian, aka Hrun of Chimeria
• Bel-Shamharoth aka "The Soul Eater", "The Sender of Eight"
• Liessa Wyrmbidder aka Lianna (possibly a typo)

Minor characters

• Bravd the Hublander
• Weasel
• Blind Hugh, a beggar
• Cripple Wa, a beggar
• Ymor, Ankh-Morpork's greatest thief
• The Patrician
• Death
• Blind Io
• Offler
• The Lady (Luck)
• Fate
• Kring (the magic sword)
• Goldeneyes Silverhand Dactylos
• Marchesa, a hydrophobic girl wizard
• Stern Withel, Ankh-Morpork's second greatest thief
• Broadman, owner of the Broken Drum
• Disease, subordinate of Death (another name for Pestilence?)
• Famine
• Gorphal, student of the Agatean Empire, works for the Patrician
• Twoflower's iconograph imp, unnamed imp that nonetheless has a speaking part
• Rerpf, representative of the Guild of Merchants and Traders
• Druellae, a dryad
• Lio!rt Dragonlord and Liartes Dragonlord, brothers
• Greicha
• K!sdra, a dragon rider
• Bronze Psepha, a dragon
• Laolith, Liessa's dragon who eats a flying pig
• Ninereeds, Twoflower's dragon
• Loremaster of Wyrmberg, who, among other things, notes that "It is forbidden to fight on the Killing Ground"
• Arch-Astronomer of Krull, who kills Dactylos
• Tethis, an alien sea troll
• Garhartra, Guestmaster of Krull

Mentioned

• Kerible the Enchanter
• Archmage of Ymitury, robbed and killed by Bravd and Weasel
• Pasha of Redurant, former owner of Kring (as Pasha of Re'durat)
• Fredor, possible owner of the Crimson Leech
• Reforgule of Krull, known for his theory that the disc revolves to distribute weight fairly on the four Giant elephants:
  • Berilia
  • Tubul
  • Great T'Phon
  • Jerakeen
• Gorrin the Cat, a thief
• Heric Whiteblade, barbarian hero
• Boy Emperor, who permitted Twoflower's journey and ordered the Patrician to protect him
• The Watch, who carefully refuse to intervene in a bar fight until everyone is either dead or has run away (in stark contrast to their later appearances)
• Erig Stronginthearm
• Black Zenell
• Nine Turning Mirrors, Grand Vizier of the Agatean Empire
• Zlorf Flannelfoot, president of the Assassins' Guild
• Captain Eightpanther, maker of rock-hard dwarf bread-like biscuits, Captain Eightpanther's Travellers' Digestives
• Grinjo, an assassin
• Urmond, an assassin
• Zephyrus, god of light breezes, named after the word zephyr
• Chance, a god
• Night, a god
• Destiny, a god
• Olden Ones, who bound magic to obey the Law of Conservation of Reality, possibly another name for the Old High Ones, to whom even the gods must answer
• Archmandrite of B'Ituni, former owner of Kring
• Codice of Chimeria, presumably (but not really) killed the last dragon
• Ninereeds the Masteraccount, to whom Twoflower was apprenticed
• Sorca, group of people who built the Light Dams of Great Nef, as designed by Dactylos
• Pitchiu, person whose tomb is protected by Dactylos' Metal Warriors (it's possible that Pitchiu is actually a location, not a person?)
• Urabewe, a tribe/race of dark brown people
• Terton, who also mans the Circumfence, is attacked by The Luggage, and escapes to the Great Nef
• Master Launchcontroller of Krull
• Alohura, Goddess of Lightning on Trob
• Scrofula, an ineffective demon

Locations

• Circle Sea (mentioned)

• Ankh-Morpork
  • Wizards' Quarter (mentioned) (also called Magicians' Quarter and Magical Quarter later in the book)
    • Unseen University (mentioned)
  • Merchants Street (mentioned)
  • Crimson Leech (mentioned)
  • Deosil Gate (mentioned)
  • Pearl Dock
  • The Broken Drum
  • Temple of Small Gods (mentioned)
  • Hub Gate (mentioned)
  • Arena (mentioned)
  • Whore Pits
  • Beggars' Guild (mentioned)
  • Brass Bridge (mentioned)
  • Temple of Seven-Handed Sek
  • Plaza of Broken Moons
  • River Gate
  • Leaning Tower
  • Rime Street
  • Frost Alley
  • Groaning Platter tavern (mentioned)
  • Short Street
  • Filigree Street
  • Widdershin Gate
  • Morpork Mountains

• Temple of Bel-Shamharoth
• Brown Islands (mentioned)

• Trob (mentioned)
  • Mount Awayawa (mentioned)
  • Orohai Peninsular (mentioned)
  • Mount Raruaruaha (mentioned)

• Counterweight Continent (mentioned)
  • Agatean Empire aka Golden Empire
    • Bes Pelargic, Twoflower's home (mentioned)
      • Red Triangle district, where the odds against a house catching fire are 538-to-1
    • Rehigreed Province, a province where vul nuts are grown

• Turnwise Ocean (mentioned), separates Agatean Empire from Ankh-Morpork

• Caderack Mountains (mentioned)

• Gonim (mentioned)

• Ecalpon (mentioned), "no place" backwards

• Chirm (mentioned), but name appears to change to the more-familiar Quirm midway through "The Sending of Eight" (did destroying Bel-Shamharoth create a minor name-changing ripple across the Disc?)

• The Hub (mentioned), spire of green ice 10 miles high

• Dunmanifestin

• Rammerorck Mountains (mentioned)

• Great Nef (mentioned)
  • Dehydrated Ocean (mentioned)

• Wyrmberg

• Zchloty (mentioned)

• Klatch (mentioned)

• Mithos (mentioned), incredibly rare blue milk diamonds come from the clay basins there

• Ice System of Zeret, a non-Discworld world affected by Rincewind's transfer to/from Roundworld

• Krull

• Palace of the Seven Deserts, built by Dactylos

• Bathys, Tethis' home world

• Gorunna Trench (mentioned)

• Pseudopolis (mentioned), Death stalks the streets there, "rescuing" citizens from the White Plague

• Hades, another name for Hell

• Howondaland (mentioned)

• Roundworld
  • Sweden, Dr Rjinswand's birthplace
  • New Jersey, where Dr Rjinswand was raised

Miscellaneous

Things and concepts mentioned:

• Big Bang, theory of creation parodying Roundworld theory with the same name
• Steady Gait, theory of creation parodying "steady state"
• Chimeran, a language (interestingly, the language is "Chimeran", even though the country is "Chimeria" (with an 'i'), unless the two are unrelated?; Rincewind mentions "Chimera" (no 'i') later in the book)
• High Borogravian, a language
• Vanglemesht, a language
• Sumtri, a language
• Black Oroogu, a language with no nouns and only one adjective (which is obscene)
• Grey Miasma of H'rull, proverbially sticky substance, parody of quicksand
• octarine, the colour of magic, after which the book is titled
• economics
• Rimbow, 8-colored rainbow seen at the edge of the Disc
• 7a
• octiron, metal that radiates magic, parodies uranium, but sounds like iron
• octogen, gas that radiates magic, parodies radon, but sounds like oxygen
• gnomes and pixies, as having died out when Man came to the Disc (though this clearly wrong as we meet gnome Buggy Swires in The Light Fantastic and the Nac Mac Feegle in the Tiffany books)
• Mage Wars
• Octarine Fairy Book, a book with pictures of dragons
• Circumfence, a strong fence around the edge of a large part of the Disc
• Ghlen Livid, a drink made from the vul nut, which allows the drinker to see into the future
• Fresnel's Wonderful Concentrator, a spell used to create a lens that skims across water, powered by the hate of hydrophobes. On Roundworld, a Fresnel lens concentrates light.
• Ajandurah's Wand of Utter Negativity, a powerful wand wielded by Marchesa
• sea grape, a kind of jellyfish
• Atavarr's Personal Gravitational Upset, a spell that makes people think they're sideways
• Gamblers' Guild
• Potent Voyager, the Disc's first? spaceship
• Vestcake's Floating Curse, a spell
• Infernal Combustion Enigma, a powerful spell, whose name parodies the phrase "internal combustion engine"

Annotations

• "Death himself turns up to claim him (instead of delegating the task to a subordinate, such as Disease or Famine, as is usually the case)." - this is the only Discworld book to suggest that Famine is subordinate to Death. The non-Discworld Good Omens also suggests this. Disease may be another name for Pestilence, or perhaps a subordinate for Pestilence?

• "the combined talents of the Faculty of Medicine had been unable to coax it." - indicates that Unseen University has a medical department, which seems unusual, since Pyramids tells us that "medicine was a new art on the Disc". Of course, given the time mangling in Thief of Time, maybe Pyramids comes before The Colour of Magic?

• "Turning To Animals is an Eighth Level spell" - a reference to Dungeons & Dragons

• "I WAS EXPECTING TO MEET THEE IN PSEUDOPOLIS [...] I COULD LEND YOU A VERY FAST HORSE." - a reference to the short story Appointment in Samarra

• People walk through Death in this book; in Mort, they walk around him

• "despatched to the islands by the Minor Religions faculty of Unseen University" - an indication that the university dabbles in religious study at this point. I wonder how the priests feel about that?

• "stable magic aura of at least [...] several milliPrime" - here, magical aura (not an amount of magic) is measured in prime, indicating that prime is a unit of field strength, not a unit of magic.

• "His sister had told him they didn't really exist" - this is the only time we hear about Twoflower's sister. She's not even mentioned in Interesting Times.

• "Dr Rjinswand, 33, a bachelor" - one of the few indications that Rincewind is fairly young, despite Josh Kirby's tendency to draw him as ancient (assuming Rjinswand is a fairly close parallel to Rincewind).

• "Vul nut wine was reputed to give certain drinkers an insight into the future which was, from the nut's point of view, the past. Strange but true.". Interestingly, Twoflower doesn't seem to be able to see into the future after drinking this wine (perhaps because he lives entirely within his own head?)

• "'you know that I never even made it to Neophyte,' said Rincewind". Apparently, "neophyte" is another name of "level 1 wizard"?

• Rincewind talks about a spell making beautiful virgins appear in your room, and also takes many picture of the Seamstresses, contradicting later comments about wizards and sex.

• In "The Colour Of Magic", Death or a subordinate evidently do have to make a personal appearance at a death, as he sends Scrofula to kill Rincewind.

• Although in Template:GG Carrot's sword is remarkable because it is one of the only known non-magic swords on the Disc, Rincewind comments magic swords are expensive in The Colour of Magic.

Roundworld References

• TWA, an airline
• Magnox, a type of nuclear reactor

Movie

Other stuff

• First published Discworld book
• First book in the series of Rincewind-books
• Originally published in Great Britain by Colin Smythe Limited.
  Copyright (c) 1983 by Terry Pratchett