Death of the Discworld

Death in the Desert. (PROSE: Pratfall)

The Death of the Discworld appeared as a tall skeletal figure with a “stygian blue” glow emanating from his eye sockets, wearing “a hooded cloak the color of a black hole’s event horizon”. He spoke in “exactly the voice of someone who would see every living thing from the creation of the universe until its final end”.

This Death was calm and polite, performing his duty with quiet dignity, neither reluctant nor gleeful. He was famous for being extremely punctual. He usually greeted mortals who had just died in the Desert, an otherworldly, seemingly infinite desert that served as the antechamber of the Discworld's afterlife. He had dominion over the Life-timers, supernatural hourglasses that represented all living things' allotted lifespans.

On many occasions, Death greeted the Jenny Everywhere of the Discworld, presenting her with her Life-timer, only for Jenny to use her shifting powers to shift some more life-sand into the upper bulb of the hourglass. Although there was nothing he could do about this, Death found this somewhat unfair, but, as Jenny once reminded him, he himself was fond of saying that “in the end, nothing is fair — in the end there is only me”. After they met so many times that Jenny felt she was beginning to get to know him, she told him he could, if he wanted, drop in on her for purely social visits even when she was not scheduled to “die”, an offer which left Death somewhat confused. (PROSE: Pratfall)

External links

• Death on L-Space, the Discworld & Terry Pratchett Wiki

Discworld-related concepts in Jenny Everywhere media
Individuals Death of the Discworld • The Hogfather Locations Agatean Empire • The Desert • Discworld Items Life-timer Other Hogswatch