#the glorious republic of treacle mine road

[elliottjpg]

⚔✊All the little angels, rise up, rise up...

This is a redraw of a very old piece, because Vimes deserves better than 2019-me's art skills.

That is not to say I look down on the original, I still love it, and it was one of my best drawings at the time. This redraw is a tribute to the Treacle Mine Road Revolution, to Pratchett's writing, to its impact on my life, to little-me, and to the passage of time.

Rise up!

[untilwearestarsinthesky]

'You took an oath to uphold the law and defend the citizens without fear or favour,' said Vimes. 'And to protect the innocent. That's all they put in. Maybe they thought those were the important things. Nothing in there about orders, even from me. You're an officer of the law, not a soldier of the government.'

Sam Vimes, Night Watch.

[dimity-lawn]

A prediction.

[dragonsweeper]

GNU Sir Pterry Pratchett.   

‘Maybe the best way to build a bright new world is to peel some spuds in this one?’

[thelibrarina]

How do they rise up?

[pixieliciousnippletassles]

I am Having Emotions today. Lil cry. But I just picked up a copy of Strata, which I've never read so I get a new new Pterry to delight over. And my little one is being read Dragons at Crumbling Castle and other short stories. He gave me so much and keeps on giving. GNU.

[witchy-rook]

Okay I’m a few days late but I keep seeing posts about the Glorious 25th of May and I need to go on a ramble about it and Night Watch as a whole, because I only recently read it and I’m a historian of revolutionary politics and this kind of shit is my jam so hard. So! Major spoilers for Night Watch  (and some of the other Guards’ Discworld books) under the cut  - be warned...!

I love love love the Glorious 25th of May and the events of the Revolution in Night Watch. My area of expertise in my real life is late-eighteenth century and nineteenth century Revolutionary European politics, so everything from the French Revolution up to and beyond the Springtime of the Peoples and the Revolutions of 1848. I loved what was written of revolutionary politics in previous Guards books, like what we hear of Stoneface Vimes in the anti-monarchial Revolution in Feet of Clay. Night Watch is especially exicting to me as it captures exquisitely how revolutions actually progress, and I love that about it.

Because all historical revolutions are, well, historical, we have a tendency to view them with a certain fixed course - after all, they did go a certain way. However, it’s important to remember that, for the people on the ground, they didn’t know where they were going, and so often it was just ad hoc reaction and improvisation. I don’t think many of the people who stormed the Bastille in 1789 would have known that in 1793 they’d execute the King. And that’s the thing: we tend to look at Revolutions like single instances of radical expression, but they’re usually long term, continuous events. They change and shift, becoming more or less extreme as events unfold.

And that’s why I love the Glorious 25th of May and the Treacle Mine Road Republic. The time travel aspect is especially poignant here because Vimes knows how things went because he was there once, but this is a new timeline, and he’s constantly aware that things could go differently if he’s not careful. Through his narration, we are also constantly reminded that no one really intended for things to turn out how they did - most of the events that led to the big revolution in the Shades were only accidentally influential. Everything from the Particulars to the Morpork Street Conspiracy even to the barricades was just people reacting to chance and circumstances. Sure, people like Reg Shoe, Rosie Palm, Madame and the various conspirators dreamed of a better city, a city without Lord Winder, but most of the people manning the barricades on the Glorious 25th were just people who lived there, people who were swept up in the fervour - people who, when the armistice is announced, go back to being normal people, taking their furniture home.

The expansion of the barricades really captures this. It often seems to me that Revolutions are a kind of living social organism that spread. In Europe, the French Revolution (both the one in 1789 and the other one in 1848) inspired other Revolutions. They spread. In Ankh-Morpork, the barricades were just meant to protect Treacle Mine Road, but they get physically pushed out by enthusiastic revolutionaries, caught up in the tide - people who are suddenly energised to push the Revolution further than it was ever originally intended. And, of course, in the real world as in Ankh-Morpork, sometimes this pushing has bad outcomes: people die, revolutionary hopes are betrayed, battles are fought and maybe things don’t change as much as was desired.

I said to my girlfriend once that, I think if magic is real, there’s a kind of magic in the Crowd or the Mob. There’s a way that, when lots and lots of people get together for a common cause, the Crowd becomes its own, emergent entity. If you’ve made it through my ramble this far and would like to read more, I’d highly recommend looking for scholarly articles about the Crowd or the Mob in the 18th or 19th century. ‘Hibernian Sans-Culottes? Dublin's Artisans and Radical Politics, 1790-1798‘ by Timothy Murtagh in La Révolution française might not be a bad place to start, if I may be so bold.

But anyway, that’s besides the point. The point is, the Glorious 25th of May might be a fake revolution in a fake city, but it’s the perfect analogue for real revolutions that happened in real cities. If you were ever wondering why X Revolution went the way it did, maybe you can look to the things Vimes sees, thinks and does in Night Watch, and maybe it will help make it a little clearer.

And if you’ve made it this far, congrats! Please do send me asks about my thoughts on this as a historian if you want, I’d love the opportunity to ramble some more.

[evilphrog]

"As I recall, they used to sing it after battles," he said. "I've seen old men cry when they sing it," he added.

"Why? It sounds cheerful."

They were remembering who they were not singing it with, thought Vimes. You'll learn. I know you will.

[zagreuses-toast]

I managed to pace myself to finish Night Watch exactly on the 25th, which gave me 1) feelings and 2) enough time to use the book to press some lilac into a bookmark

[untilwearestarsinthesky]

'Do you mean to tell me that you want to join the army just to loot the battlefields?' said the major, completely shocked. 'A little... lad like you?'

'Once, when ol' Sconner was sober for two days together he made me a little set of soldiers,' said Nobby. 'An' they had these little boots that you could-'

'Shut up,' said the major.

'-take off, and tiny tiny little wooden teeth that you could-'

'Will you shut up!' said the major. 'Have you no interest in honour? Glory? Love of city?'

'Dunno. Can you get much for 'em?' said Nobby.

'They are priceless.'

'Oh, well, in that case, I'll stick with the boots, if it's all the same to you,' said Nobby.

[mirtadraws]

Truth, Justice, Freedom, Reasonably Priced Love, and a Hard-Boiled Egg!

[dimity-lawn]

[beardedmrbean]

[timetravelingsherlockian]

Continuation/Completion from last year.

OG post: https://www.tumblr.com/timetravelingsherlockian/685438770183536640?source=share

[lostmidnightwriter]

Happy Glorious 25th of May to the People's Republic of Treacle Mine Road. 🥚

[somefrecklyginger]