RR+: Now available with Steady, in memoriam of Terry Pratchett: Footnotes.

I am very proud to inform you that the crowdfunding network I am with, Steady¹ (think Patreon, just better, with no enshittification and no nazis), has added another feature that I may claim as having started it all: Footnotes!

Some of you may know that I have a very personal connection to Pterry.

And yes, funnily enough I used to be married to FrenchAngua. Or, as she would have it, Sauron². So, yes, my love for Discworld is very personal.

I can to this very day remember where I was when we first had news of Terry Pratchett’s passing. I was at the Leipzig Book Fair (Opens in a new window) where I was part of the jury of the fantasy literature award SERAPH (Opens in a new window) and the awards for the different categories were just being handed out.

A good friend of mine sidled up to me, showed me her phone where she had pulled up the official account of @TerryAndRob and said: “Terry Pratchett is dead.”

And more or less instantly around us, with thousands of people in this massive fair hall, a whisper broke out, turned into a crescendo, stopping the award ceremony in its tracks… and then quiet descended.

An overwhelming feeling of loss was palpable.

Even today, sitting in some regional train, travelling past the beautiful Rhine and even more beautiful castles³, in perfect state or in ruin, writing these words makes me cry.

I had always envied the Pratchett community for having their author be amongst them, talking to them, appreciating them. And now I was one of those who felt the loss just as poignantly because I love Discworld, too.

Anyway.

Because the tenth year of remembering his life and his works was upon us and because I felt this was sorely missing I requested another feature for the writing backend I am using to do all of my stuff with Steady.

Yes, yes, yes: FOOTNOTES⁴.

And on March 19, 2025, just one week after the #GNU memorial day this was posted to the Steady Community Slack:

If you are asking yourself "WHY?!” then I can’t really help you. But…

I love footnotes⁵, they have been part of my personal reading experience and my academic training [British & American History, Modern German History, as well as English Literature & Linguistics - with a smattering of Romance Studies (French) and Historical Comparative Linguistics (kinda what Tolkien did!)], and I love them to death.

They are useful, they are lovely elements in book design, and they will show that you actually did all of the work that you claim to have done. You can’t fake footnotes! 😅

And if Pterry loved them, that should be reason enough.

Case in point? The official biography is called…

So if you happen to be with Steady in any shape or form, either as a creative mind or as someone enjoying all of these wonderful people’s creativity, and you see FOOTNOTES (Opens in a new window) in the future with anyone on here…

Let people know about the one-and-only Roving Ranger (Opens in a new window), the weekly newsletter on all things Tolkienian.

Maybe consider a trial with my place here (Opens in a new window) at Steady and get to read ~400 posts [at the time of writing, with something like an average 2-3 posts a week!]

Or have a look at my Linktree (Opens in a new window) so you can follow me on your favourite social media channel, my blog etc…

Have a great day, y’all!⁶

1. Steady grew out of the necessity of having decent journalism being paid for via subscriptions so it could be independent of clicks, ragebait, and capitalist abuse - the first such project, one of the biggest in the world so far - is Krautreporter (Opens in a new window). And fun fact - I happened to be at the start-up weekend in Berlin when it was first mentioned (Opens in a new window). ↩

2. Yes, indeed. She was Sauron. Her argument for the femininity of Sauron is iron-clad: “What would a bloke do when he lost a piece of jewelry. Nuffin’. What would a woman do when she lost a piece of jewelry…?” For more on this have a look at AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER. How Discworld shaped my life: Remembering Sir Terry Pratchett (or rather, PTERRY.) (Opens in a new window) ↩

3. Most recently the amazing Ted Nasmith participated in the 25th Anniversary edition of the Lure of Middle-earth (Opens in a new window) gaming convention at Castle Stahleck (Opens in a new window). ↩

4. True, DEATH speaks in all caps. And if you need proof of my love for Discworld - yes, I have been to several Discworld conventions (Opens in a new window) where I met Pterry and the next German DW Con is happening in May (Opens in a new window) [close to the village of CRACKAJOKEHOME aka Witzenhausen (Opens in a new window)! P.S. That’s a horrible pun.] ↩

5. Yeah, you read ONE volume of this (Opens in a new window). Do it! Show me you are willing to put in the work. And then thou shalt know there is only one way: hate them… or love 🥰🥰🥰 them! ↩

6. You see? FOOTNOTES ARE SO COOL! 🤩🤩🤩 ↩