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Some thoughts on Terry Pratchett's Hogfather:
I'm just over halfway through this book, and at this point, he is having lots of fun contrasting the ancient "'Real meaning' ofChristmas Hogwatch", as a festival (if you can call it that) of feasting and human sacrifice in order to insure the return of the Sun, and the modern "Real meaning" of the holiday, as a festival of feasting and "Wouldn't it be nice if everyone were nice?"
Seems pretty clear to me that both meanings were the "real" meaning -- if you rephrase both versions as "Do what you can to survive the winter" (you can't add apples and oranges, but you can add "pieces of fruit").
Humans began the practice of agriculture, and started paying attention to the cycles of planting and harvest at around the time they began the practice of human and animal sacrifice. Back then, there was (say) an 85 to 90% chance that those under the age of five and over the age of sixty would die from starvation and illness between the last winter harvest and the first spring one. With those kinds of odds, you'd pretty much do whatever you could to save as many lives as possible -- including sacrificing a few to save the many.
However, as time went on, and ploughs and hybrids of grain improved, you now had an 85 to 90% chance that everyone in the family would survive the winter -- everyone from baby Isabelle, who was teething, to crazy uncle Bob, who insisted that the goblins were coming to get him, to Grandpa, who just wished that everyone would stop mumbling and mind their manners -- all cramped together in a one room hut, with a fireplace that filled the house with smoke whenever the wind blew the wrong way for four long months until it would be warm enough to go outside and get away from each other... add into the mix the fact that metal knives were now common, and "Wouldn't it be nice if everyone were nice?" isn't just a soothing plattitude, it's the survival strategy smart families rely on...
Just my two pennies' worth...
I'm just over halfway through this book, and at this point, he is having lots of fun contrasting the ancient "'Real meaning' of
Seems pretty clear to me that both meanings were the "real" meaning -- if you rephrase both versions as "Do what you can to survive the winter" (you can't add apples and oranges, but you can add "pieces of fruit").
Humans began the practice of agriculture, and started paying attention to the cycles of planting and harvest at around the time they began the practice of human and animal sacrifice. Back then, there was (say) an 85 to 90% chance that those under the age of five and over the age of sixty would die from starvation and illness between the last winter harvest and the first spring one. With those kinds of odds, you'd pretty much do whatever you could to save as many lives as possible -- including sacrificing a few to save the many.
However, as time went on, and ploughs and hybrids of grain improved, you now had an 85 to 90% chance that everyone in the family would survive the winter -- everyone from baby Isabelle, who was teething, to crazy uncle Bob, who insisted that the goblins were coming to get him, to Grandpa, who just wished that everyone would stop mumbling and mind their manners -- all cramped together in a one room hut, with a fireplace that filled the house with smoke whenever the wind blew the wrong way for four long months until it would be warm enough to go outside and get away from each other... add into the mix the fact that metal knives were now common, and "Wouldn't it be nice if everyone were nice?" isn't just a soothing plattitude, it's the survival strategy smart families rely on...
Just my two pennies' worth...
