According to Terry Pratchett, the Discworld novels were written as general fantasy fiction but then marketed at an adult audience by his publishing house. Pratchett seemed to find it highly amusing that his Truckers books (allegedly for children) had also made the adult bestseller lists.
- The Discworld novels were marketed at adults
SysOp Barb Delaplace: Terry, I'm reading Truckers and finding it delightful. When did you start writing juvenile fiction?
Terry Pratchett: Barb ... I thought that's what I always write . I just write, and it sort of finds its own level. Truckers is only marketed for kids, the Discworld is marketed for adults, that -- apart from a few one-liners -- is all it is. Funnily enough, it's respectable to write fantasy for children, but not for adults.
Latterly, Pratchett defined how you can tell the difference between his books that are written for adults and those that are intentionally aimed at children, by determining whether they're broken up into chapters.
- Latterly, Pratchett defined how you can tell the difference between his books that are written for adults and those that are intentionally aimed at children, by determining whether they're broken up into chapters.
Q. Why aren't the Discworld books divided into chapters?
TP: I don't think in chapters - I can't understand why they are required. As far as I can see their only purpose is so that people reading at night can say, 'I'll read to the end of the chapter and turn the light off!' You can turn the light off whenever you like - that's what bookmarks are for.
But when I'm writing books for children, I use chapters. I go back through the finished text, decide how many chapters I'm going to use, then find suitable places for them.
Wyrd and Wonderful: The Young Telegraph No.345 May 17 1997
- Pratchett felt that the Discworld books were "uni-age", suitable for young and old alike.
Terry: Well, one of the things I like to do is get kids reading. And for some reason, I don't know why it is, and lots of people have been telling me at this convention, it tends to go like this, you know, "My boy is more or less dyslexic and wouldn't read any books, and I've got him on Discworld and now he's a Professor of Comparative Linguistics at Oxford University. I think that's all about writing fantasy, it's a strange kind of fantasy, that I write, it isn't kind of like the normal sort. It is that it's uni-age, you can enjoy it as an adult and you can enjoy it as a child, but I always make certain that the ones that are expressly children's books are written with kids in mind. 'Cause there is nothing worse than pretending that it's a children's book, but waving at mom and dad over the top of the page. That sometimes happens. If you get the Carnegie Medal for a children's book, which I got for the Amazing Morris and his Educated Rodents, there are children's librarians voting for that, and kids themselves and they know if it's a children's book or not.