Maurice, Der Kater (English title: The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents ) is a novel by Terry Pratchett . It's the twenty-eighth Discworld novel, but was initially conceived as a fantastic children's book. Terry Pratchett won his first major book award, the annual Carnegie Medal of the British Book Trade for the best children's book of the year.
Maurice the Hangover was published in 2001 . The action takes place in Bad Blintz, a health resort in Überwald. Maurice the Hangover is one of the cultural stories, and the eponymous hero Maurice also has the most prominent role in the lucrative pied piper trick. Otherwise, the story is based heavily on the Pied Piper of Hameln and was probably also inspired by the works of Beatrix Potter .
Maurice, der Kater is a book about the ambivalent relationship between humans and animals, but also between animals and animals when, as in this case, the animal participants are able to speak. Who is there for whose use and whether that is the right question at all has to be discussed every minute. Maurice , protagonist and namesake, is a street cat with a scarred face and torn ears. Maurice fears that thinking and speaking happened to him after eating one of the new, intelligent rats that lived on the Invisible University rubbish heap . Since he is now working with these rats, he even knows their name, it was called “ preservatives ”.
A dream drives the "The Changed", as the rat clan also calls themselves , forward. They would like to build an original rat civilization on a desert island. Maurice, a real street cat, knows how the world works and that you need money for something like that. Together with the rats and a stupid looking boy named Keith, he organizes a profitable business.
The clan consists of about 100 members. As soon as they reach a new city, they first stage an impressive plague of rats. They pee in the milk, swim in the toilet and steal the teeth of seniors from the mouth. Such audacity quickly arouses the desire in citizens for a definitive solution to the rat problem. At this moment, Maurice and Keith, the flute player, appear and offer their expensive services. After they have cashed heavily, the Pied Piper lures the rats out of town, and the squad disappears, never to be seen again.
“Dangerous beans”, the first rat philosopher, considers this to be unethical. In Bad Blintz, a health resort in Überwald , the pied piper trick is to be performed for the last time. You get in the way of the local pied piper, who just have their own, much meaner, rip-off going on. The harmless attempt at fraud turns into a life-and-death battle, which Maurice and the clan narrowly win. With the evidence against the rascals among humans in their paws, the rats and the city council negotiate, ultimately successfully, about a peaceful coexistence between rats and humans. The rat clan becomes a tourist attraction in Bad Blintz , and everyone lives happily ever after - except for Maurice. He looks for the next stupid looking boy to learn a new, sensational trick with him. Because people want to be cheated.
The Scholars of the Disc World (1999, German 2004) • The Philosophers of the Round World. More from the scholars of the Discworld (2002, German 2004) • Darwin and the Gods of the Discworld (2005, German 2006) • The Last Judgment. The Science of Discworld 4 (2013, German 2013)
Other books
The Disc World from A – Z (with Stephen Briggs ; 1994, German 1996) • The Disc World Album (1996, German 2001) • GURPS Disc World (with Phil Masters ; 1998, German 1999) • Nanny Oggs Cookbook (1999, German 2001) . 2001) • GURPS Discworld Also (with Phil Masters ; 2001) • The Art of Discworld (2004, German 2006) • Where's my Cow (2005) • Wit and Wisdom of Discworld (2007, German 2010) • Myths and legends the Discworld (with Jacqueline Simpson ; 2008, German 2009) • The World of Poo (2012) • Fools, Thieves and Vampires - The best of ten years of Discworld calendars (with Stephen Briggs ; 2012, German 2012)
Discworld maps
The Streets of Ankh-Morpork - A Discworld Map (1993; Ger. 1996) • The Discworld Mapp (1995) • A Tourist Guide to Lancre - A Discworld Mapp (1998) • Death's Domain - A Discworld Mapp (1999) • More complete and indispensable Ankh-Morpork city guide (2012, German 2013) • Mrs. Bradshaw's most useful handbook for all routes of the Hygienic Railway Ankh-Morpork and Sto Plain (2014, German 2015)
The whole madness (2004, German 2007) • Big words (2012, German 2018) • Twisted dragon (2014, German 2015) • The vacuum-sucking fright screw (2016, German 2018)
