OK, I've read most everything by Gaiman, and I've got my MA in mythology, so I pride myself on being able to get most of Gaiman's refrences, but in the short story in "We can get that for you in Bulk" in Smoke and Mirrors, I just don't get the ending. "We always could, but we needed someone to ask..." Does anyone know what this reference is supposed to be?

Thanks!

I as well would like to know what this is a referance too, if anyone would happen to know.

My copy is a couple states away right now, so my explanation is from memory. As I remember it, it is a comment on their ability to kill everyone on Earth - it's just that they needed someone to actually ask for it before they could do it. And since the main character is someone who just can't resist a bargain...

We understand how the quote relates to the story itself, we were wondering if the qupote is a referance from something outside of neil gaimans works

Well, in the old stories, the Devil doesn't often initiate his dealings. Could just be that.

Good point, that does make sense. Does anyone else have another referance or a confirmation on this one?

I never really thought of the ending as a specific reference, just a twist. The title is a reference, but nothing else imho. What Dweller said could be true, but that's not so much reference as tradition

Well, like all jobs it's not fun to do things if you were not asked... I could translate the whole Sandman series on my own, if I wanted to, but wouldn't it be so much better if the publishers commissioned me to do it? That's how I understood the line.

That doesn't feel right to me. Gaiman constantly refrences outside mythology in his works. I can go through smoke and Mirrors and pick out refrences story by story. To me this clearly feels like a refrece that I'm just not getting. If you read the story the end screams out "You're supposed to get it now."

The expliantion with the devil is a possibility, but I think it something else. A refrence to a fariy tale, or obscure mythology.

Any other ideas?

I agree with Jewell, I think that this is probobly a referance to something deeper, I am curious to know what to if anytone can find it.

Maybe this is a way to say that what occurs to mankind is done BY humans. We are responsible for what happens to us. If we dislike it, it's our fault. Maybe the main character is a "metaphore" of our errors...

quote:

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Originally posted by ApocalypseBlue:
OK, I've read most everything by Gaiman, and I've got my MA in mythology, so I pride myself on being able to get most of Gaiman's refrences, but in the short story in "We can get that for you in Bulk" in Smoke and Mirrors, I just don't get the ending. "We always could, but we needed someone to ask..." Does anyone know what this reference is supposed to be?

Thanks!

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I dunno. I thought it was a reference to the old Cold War Pentagon/Kremlin quest for getting "More Bang for your Buck, more rubble for your rubles" (more efficient atomic weapons, etc)?

The drive to BUILD more and more evil weapons just because you CAN.

I admit it's set up as if it means something far more specific though ...

I think it was just taking the idea of selling whackings wholesale to its logical conclusions.

However, the "Dirty Donkey" bit does seem to add a mythologic spin to the whole thing, so there might be a deeper reference.

quote:

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Originally posted by VegaRiad:
I think it was just taking the idea of selling whackings wholesale to its logical conclusions.

However, the "Dirty Donkey" bit does seem to add a mythologic spin to the whole thing, so there might be a deeper reference.

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I didn't read too much into the "Dirty Donkey" reference as there are loads of pubs with similar names, The Dirty Duck for example. If there is another reference, the only one i can think of is Don Quixote. Just took the requirement of someone asking to be a extrapolation of the invokation clause in daemonology. Dear old Cthulu and his chums don't just rise up from the mighty depths and destroy mankind. Someone needs to set off the alarm clock first.

Near the end it commented that the sign wasn't so much like a dirty donkey, but more like a pale horse...

And it trailed off like that too.

Peter meets Kemble four times,and it's after the fourth that the definately dirty donkey changes to a pale horse. The fifth contract is made over the phone, and the fifth horseman unleashed. This could be totally insignificant. As could the name of the street in which the pub resides (Little Courtney) also be. Even though there is no such street in London.

blarrrgnhnar

An allusion to mankind's possession of 'free will' maybe? After all, how much free will could we have if the devils/disciples of cthullu/bush administration could just wipe us out any old time they wanted?


- Soul

what is the reference of the name of the firm?

"Burke Hare Ketch"

It's "Ketch Burke Hare Ketch", actually.

Four names...another nod towards the Four Horsemen conclusion, asides from the pale horse connection (Rev. 6:8).

Burke and Hare were Edinburgh body snatchers, supplying corpses for dissection from fresh graves and later fresh people.

Ketch (both of them) is Jack Ketch, the generic name for a Hangman. Possible reason for its' repetition is that the name is passed from hangman to hangman.

Or to read more into it:

Jack Ketch would hang a person. The body would be stolen by Burke and Hare. Who were then caught and hung. By Jack Ketch. Implying that it's all cyclical and the wholesale destruction that peter orders results in the big bang.

Though the last bit might be a little off.