Small Gods :: essays research papers fc

Small GodsThe World rides by dint of space on the back of a turn turtle. This is one of the great antiquated world myths, found wherever men and turtles were gathitherd together the iv elephants were an IndoEuropean sophistication. The idea has been lying in the lumber rooms of fable for centuries. All I had to do was grab it and run away onwards the alarms went off. Discworld is based on a slew of old myths, which reach their almost refined form in Hindu mythology, which in turn of course derived from the passe-partout Star Trek episode Planet of Wobbly Rocks where the Security Guard Got Shot (Pratchett, terry cloth. fitting p 216).      Terry Pratchett is the author of a popular fantasy series that is set in Discworld, a planet that is as flat as a pancake. It sails on forever, a flat, circular world carried on the backs of cardinal elephants supported on the back of Atuin, the giant space turtle. The turtle doesnt stand on anything, so dont ask. It swims on through the infinite universe (Huckaby n.pag.). In his book Small Gods, Terry Pratchett succeeds in satirizing most of the worlds major religions and a few ancient political policies by expressing his thoughts and feelings through his own brand of climate and witticism. In the Discworld, there are a numerous amount of gods, coercive and weak. Small Gods takes a look into the realm of Ominia, a vast empire devoted to the Greater Glory of their god Om. The Gods of Discworld have a rattling unique power source. Their power depends upon having believers a god with no believers fades into a powerless, wandering spirit or dies. The Great God Om has a sizeable church, yet has only one real believer, a novice monastic named Brutha. Drained of supportive power, he finds himself trapped in the body of an indifferent tortoise. Imagine the discomfiture a god might experience if confronted with almost of the beliefs taught in his name -- and some of the "divinely inspired&quo t actions taken by his followers as a result. Om, in his little tortoise shell, also comes to the confuse realization that, while his religion is vast and has many zealous worshippers, he has very few actual honest-to-Om believers. One, actually (Knapp n.pag.). Pratchett shows a struggle between a god and his religion, which no has no room for him. He shows a cynical side like most British humorists in that there may be religions existing whose god died out long ago from lack of belief.