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When one looks in the box, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the cat.

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Books Terry Pratchett

See the Unpublished Works of Terry Pratchett… On This Steamrollered Harddrive

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Published on August 30, 2017

Photo by Silverlutra
Photo by Silverlutra

Sorry fans, no “Unfinished Tales” for Sir Terry Pratchett. Per his personal request, all of the projects he was working on up to his death have been crushed by a steamroller.

Don’t worry, your screen is not smudged. You did just read “steamroller.”

Rob Wilkins, who manages the Pratchett estate, recently brought the hard drive in question to the Great Dorset Steam Fair. There, it was crushed by a vintage steamroller named Lord Jericho.

Terry Pratchett's hard drive

After Tweeting a picture of the crushed remains, Wilkins announced that what’s left of the hard drive will be put on display at the Salisbury Museum’s upcoming exhibition, Terry Pratchett: HisWorld, starting on September 16th. So you can see the last stories Terry Pratchett ever worked on! You know, on this… scrapped circuit board.

Following Pratchett’s death in 2015, Neil Gaiman informed The Times that having his work destroyed in such a way was among the author’s last requests. It took a couple of years, but the deed has finally been done. No bits of story to be trotted out and expanded upon by another author. No half-finished manuscripts to speculate on. No unedited paragraphs to poke at for typos.

As it becomes easier and easier for us to leave work and sundry behind thanks to the seemingly endless space available on computers and clouds and social media, it’s important to decide where it all ends up. Good on Sir Terry for having such precise plans regarding the last of his work. Vintage steamroller is one classy form of destruction.

About the Author

About Author Mobile

Emmet Asher-Perrin

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Emmet Asher-Perrin is the News & Entertainment Editor of Reactor. Their words can also be perused in tomes like Queers Dig Time Lords, Lost Transmissions: The Secret History of Science Fiction and Fantasy, and Uneven Futures: Strategies for Community Survival from Speculative Fiction. They cannot ride a bike or bend their wrists. You can find them on Bluesky and other social media platforms where they are mostly quiet because they'd rather to you talk face-to-face.
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