I'd intended to update my list each time I finished a book, but since The Light Fantastic could also be called The Colour of Magic II or Discworld II - The Light Fantastic then I will pass on this and simply declare that and the end of the second book we have a draw.
If Peter Jackson ever bought the film rights to the Discworld novels then presumably we could have six three hour films from these first two novels alone.
Time to move on: The Light Fantastic was published in 1986 with an initial print run of just 1034 copies.
1986 was a busy year as my then fiancée (now wife) decided to merge our libraries and buy a house together. Strangely enough there was little overlap beyond Tolkien and Susan Cooper (The Dark Is Rising quintet) but we did our best to rehome the duplications.
Meanwhile in the real world Pixar Animation Studios opened for business, Microsoft held its IPO and Dragon Quest was released.
On the book front it seems to have been a pretty quiet year, with only a few fantasy novels published/recognised:
HP Lovecraft: a corrected version of Dagon and Other Stories. I'd read HPL as teenager so this was not something to follow up.
In the US the wonderfully weirs Illuminatus Trilogy won an award, but I'd read it many years earlier.
Postscript
There is one other book published this year that is worth mentioning: Howl's Moving Castle by Diane Wynne Jones. I've not read the book but loved the animated version from Studio Ghibli:
Several years ago I read The Tough Guide To Fantasy Land by DWJ: apparently some institutions have categorised it as a dictionary, but in fact it is a wickedly funny spoof guide book to the standard characters and situations you find in some fantasy stories. I have a copy on my shelf and refer to it regularly on my travels: what I had not realised until today is that it was shortlisted for a Hugo award for Best Nonfiction Book, and it is a shmae that it did not win.
Last night I started watching the DVD of Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic(as it says on the box) and was delighted to find that it is 189 minutes long, i.e. two films for the price of one. In effect I watched The Colour of Magic and still have The Light Fantastic to come.
The film was made for TV with (presumably) a TV budget but within these constraints it was excellent. The casting of the main roles was superb (I think David Jason gave a definitive Rincewind) and I finally know how to pronounce his name. inevitably there was some editing of the story but that is standard for any adaptation (especially in the disaster called The Golden Compass) but the effects were good, well up to the standard of Doctor Who (and I mean that as a compliment).
