On nights such as this, evil deeds are done. And good deeds, of course. But mostly evil, on the whole.

On nights such as this, witches are abroad.
   Well, not actually abroad. They don't like the food and you can't trust the water and the shamans always hog the deckchairs.

Only Terry Pratchett can turn a storm, a cat and a castle into actual characters in a novel. The cat being Greebo, the castle being in Lancre (rhymes with... canker? hanker? banker?... Sometimes the author's puns are so obscure you're left confused. I mean, Sto Plains is obvious - stop lanes - but Sto Lat? Al Khali, and Bad Schuschein, I grant you, and Pseudopolis just means "fake city", but what is the significance of Ankh-Morpork? Sometimes, I think I look for hidden meanings in what is simply humourous, like Bong Phut) and the storm moves through a repertoire like an actor learning his/her craft, understudying the big weather in the hopes of being noticed by the more important climates...

Only in Lancre are there villages with names like Mad Stoat and Bad Ass (there was a disobedient donkey, apparently - see Equal Rites) and witches are something of an institution. There's Granny Weatherwax (the most respected of the leaders that witches don't have), Nanny Ogg, matriarch of the Oggs, and Magrat Garlick - who's a bit of a wet hen, with hair like a flowery peat hag and a chest like an ironing board, but who nevertheless tries her best.

If it comes to that, Terry Pratchett is the only author who would satirise three of Shakespeare's plays in one book, let alone the Marx Brothers, Laurel and Hardy and Charlie Chaplain's 'Little Tramp'. Oh well, at least he does it well.

Lets see, it's mostly Macbeth, a bit of Hamlet, and what I believe is Henry IV part 1 (with Prince Hal and Falstaff in a bar - although in no universe but that of the Discworld could Falstaff be a dwarf named Hwel - hwel what? nher nher nher). A king is murdered, his son is rescued and becomes a 'strolling Thespian', although no-one knows where Thespia is, and there is a Fool, who had a miserable childhood in the Guild of Fools and Joculators, learning all the ancient Jests, Japes and Juggles and repeating the whole Monster Fun Book by rote. No wonder he looks like an utter pillock who capers automatically and says `Marry, Nuncle' and `Prithee' a lot. And `I'faith'. He practises juggling till his elbows creak. You just have to feel sorry for him.

Greebo increased his grip. He had found a friend.
   The Fool shrugged, very carefully, turned, and walked back into the passage. He made his way down through the hall, out into the courtyard, around the side of the guardroom and out through the main gate, nodding - carefully - to the guards.
   "Man just went past with a cat on his head," one of them remarked, after a minute or two's reflection.
   "See who it was?"
   "The Fool, I think."
   There was a thoughtful pause. The second guard shifted his grip on his halberd.
   "It's a rotten job," he said. "But I suppose someone's got to do it."

Keep a lookout for one of the first dwarf bars in Ankh-Morpork, Death's Big Scene, a cauldron with all yuk in it, and a play that doesn't quite work out the way it was intended to. All in a night's work for a Lancre witch, apparently. Ooh, and a bashful standing stone that can never be counted, seeing as it sneaks around behind you when you try...