The staff usually come in a group in the books in which they appear, though
Rincewind initially followed his own storyline, only being a part of the group in the
Science of Discworld books and
Unseen Academicals, and the
Librarian makes solo appearances in several books.
Ridcully and Ponder also appeared in
Going Postal and
Night Watch. Ridcully alone appears in
Thud!. The wizards are referred to by their offices (e.g. "Lecturer in Recent Runes"), rather than names. There is a slight reference to this in
The Last Continent, when the wizards notice that they not only don't know the Librarian's name, but they also don't know the names of one another. In
Unseen Academicals, Ridcully has difficulty remembering the Dean's name, despite having started at UU around the same time.
Archchancellor The head of Unseen University is the
Archchancellor, an important figure who holds a seat on the Ankh-Morpork council, although this council itself has no power either, acts as a magical adviser to the
Patrician. The Archchancellor of UU is considered the leader of all wizards on the Disc (by those at the UU), the
first among equals (i.e. the other eighth-level wizards). Unseen University has existed for thousands of years, and the average Archchancellor remains in office for about eleven months. There are eight eighth-level wizards and the number becomes progressively higher as the level decreases. It is common to ascend through the ranks by assassinating superiors. This has been known as the tradition of "dead man's pointy shoes."
Mustrum Ridcully becomes the Archchancellor of
Unseen University in the
tenth Discworld novel Moving Pictures, and holds it for the rest of the series. Unlike recent holders, Ridcully enjoys an injury-free term as Archchancellor, by bringing a halt to the traditional method of promotion simply by being
indestructible. This is related to his habit of springing up behind would-be assassins, shouting loudly at them and banging their head repeatedly in the door. He is also known as
Ridcully the Brown, being a country wizard and his affinity to small animals, similar to that of '
Radagast the Brown', but in Ridcully's place it's how he can hunt them. Ridcully assumed the role of Archchancellor after an absence of forty years, having become a Seventh Level Wizard at the exceptionally young age of twenty-seven, he left to look after his family's
land. He loves crossbow hunting and uses the corridors of Unseen University as a shooting range. He was a
Rowing Brown for the university in his youth and has a different relationship to sport unlike his fellows who prefer
competitive eating and Extreme Napping. Ridcully's form of governorship is that, if someone is still trying to explain something to him after about two minutes, it must be worth listening to and if they give up earlier, it was not worth bothering him with in the first place. He gets on best with Ponder Stibbons, as he never understands what Ponder is saying and in return Ponder never expects him to. His brother is Hughnon Ridcully, High Priest of Blind Io and
Ankh-Morpork's religious spokesman.
Lords and Ladies reveals that he and a young
Esme Weatherwax were in a relationship some fifty years before Ridcully became Archchancellor. He is deeply affected by her death (''
The Shepherd's Crown''). Ridcully has shown the occasional flash of magical skill. For example, in
Moving Pictures, the Bursar is surprised to discover Ridcully's adeptness at using a magic mirror, which, like most Discworld
scrying devices, is hard to steer. In
Soul Music Ridcully improvises, at short notice and with minimal assistance, a slimmed-down version of the rite of AshkEnte for summoning Death. It is also implied that he has some degree of practical magic knowledge (
The Last Continent). In the
Cosgrove Hall animation of
Soul Music he was voiced by
Graham Crowden. In 2006's two-part adaptation of
Hogfather he was played by
Joss Ackland, and in the 2010 adaptation of
Going Postal he was portrayed by
Timothy West.
Bursar Professor A.A. Dinwiddie, DM (7th), D.Thau., B.Occ., M.Coll. first appears in the
ninth Discworld novel Faust Eric as a quiet, reserved person. He took the post of university treasurer because of his affinity for numbers. (The Archchancellor describes him as "
one of those idiot servants") There was less competition for the role than for other faculty posts. The previous Bursar, Spelter, was killed trying to save the library from destruction in
Sourcery. Dinwiddie expected a relatively safe office to hold since nobody else actually wanted to be bursar and dreamed of spending the rest of his life quietly adding up rows of figures. Unfortunately, shortly after he became Bursar, Mustrum Ridcully became Archchancellor. Ridcully's personality wear away at the Bursar, whose idea of excitement is a soft-boiled egg, which ultimately leads to his sanity slowly evaporating, by the events of
Reaper Man, the Bursar is almost completely insane. He keeps barely functional by experimental dosages of dried frog pills, though the effects are erratic. The pills are hallucinogens, the other wizards hope they will cause him to hallucinate being sane. An improper dose causes
catatonia or
disorganized schizophrenia.
Hex temporarily inherited the Bursar's condition after having a "
conversation" with him, until Archchancellor Ridcully remedied the matter by convincing the ant-run thinking engine it had just been administered "LOTS OF DRYD FRORG P¼LLS". The Bursar's insanity became a
byword in
Ankh-Morpork; "
to go totally Bursar" is "
to go totally doolally".
The Dean The Dean of Pentacles — is a senior wizard, archetypally argumentative and lazy. He is generally found in his study reading a
grimoire or more likely, in the
great hall, eating. The Dean is particularly susceptible to occult or semi-magical occurrences, fads, or trends – most notably in
Soul Music, where he slicks back his
hair and takes to wearing a
live fast die gnu leather jacket. However when the occasion arises, he can be among the more enthusiastic and competent of his peers; being a part-time Watch Special Constable – on the proviso that he not use magic in the course of his duties. He is very obese, earning the nickname, 'Two Chairs' from Mustrum, which sees him purchase a custom double-width chair. He and Archchancellor Ridcully have been friends since their first days at the university. By the time of
Unseen Academicals the Dean becomes the first person to voluntarily resign from the university in memory; to become
Archchancellor Henry of Brazeneck College of
Pseudopolis. Ridcully regards this as traitorous despite their long friendship. On the Dean's first return visit to UU, Ridcully cannot decide how to address him and eventually remembers his fore-name is Henry. By the end of the novel, Ridcully is comfortable enough with The Dean's presence to refer to him as 'Dean', which Henry ignores.
Librarian The Librarian first appeared in the second novel of the series,
The Light Fantastic, where he was transformed in a magical accident into an
orang-utan, as the great magical tome of the Creator, the Octavo was working a spell reshaping the world to ensure that
Rincewind did not leave the Disc. On discovering that being an orang-utan had certain advantages for a librarian — he could climb up to high shelves, for example — he refused to be transformed back into a human and has remained an orang-utan ever since. The wizards are so used to this that "if someone ever reported that there was an orang-utan in the Library, the wizards would probably go and ask the Librarian if he'd seen it." He is known for his violent reaction to most people calling him a "
monkey", as he is technically an
ape. He primarily uses the word
Ook, inflected for simple affirmations and negations, though he occasionally uses
Eeek in moments of panic or rage. Most people seem able to understand him. As with other members of the UU faculty, the Librarian is referred to by his office and not by a name. If his name were known, he could be changed back into a human, and by the time of
The Last Continent novel, he has carefully excised his name from the records of the Unseen University.
The Discworld Companion hints and
The Art of Discworld confirms that the Librarian was Dr Horace Worblehat, and that his fears of turning back into human are baseless at most.
Rincewind is apparently the only wizard who still remembers the Librarian's name, but has agreed not to tell anyone, and no one else talks about it. who had previously played
Corporal Nobbs in ''
Terry Pratchett's Hogfather''. Ponder is the only senior member for the UU faculty to be without a beard. In the film version of
Terry Pratchett's Hogfather he is portrayed by
Ed Coleman.
Doctor Hix Dr John Hix – 'Hicks with an X' in
Unseen Academicals, after changing his name from Hicks because it didn't suit his position. Dr Hix is a
necromancer. Since necromancy is officially banned in Ankh-Morpork, he is instead the Head of the Department of Postmortem Communications (although he acknowledges this is just a fancy way of saying necromancy). Hix has one member of staff, a reanimated skeleton called Charlie. He previously had another member of staff, the late Professor Flead, but Hix bound him to a club at the end of
Making Money. Hix frequently misbehaves, performs evil deeds and makes comments in bad taste as he is required to under university statute, a fact which the other members of UU grudgingly accept. He uses the phrase "Skull ring, remember?" as an excuse for his misbehavior, much like the
Patrician's use of the phrase, "Tyrant, remember?". Hix may be a parody of
Peter Higgs.
Hex Hex is a continually growing, magic-powered, self-building
computer featuring ants and cheese as part of his architecture, and is housed in the basement of the High Energy Magic Building at the university. He is the UU's first mainframe computer, though instead of RAM, is powered by a waterwheel inside a ram skull, and its
mouse is an actual
mouse. Hex's "brain" consists of a series of glass tubes filled with ants, which form his processor, and a beehive in a back room, which constitutes the hard drive. He bears a sticker up front saying that there is an anthill inside (a parody of the advertising slogan "
Intel Inside"). Initially just a computer, helping with complicated calculations for spells and controlling the operations of complicated magical instruments, Hex has gradually developed more of a personality over the course of the series, being cranky, recalcitrant, demanding more cheese and believing in the Hogfather. Ponder Stibbons has by default become the person in charge of developing and operating Hex, though he admits that Hex largely develops itself. After a conversation with the Bursar, Hex contracted a virus which was similar to the '
cookie', whereby Hex could only work if 'Dried Frog pills' was typed into his typewriter. Previously, other "computers" on the Disc consisted of
stone circles. Hex runs and evolves under the watchful eyes of Ponder Stibbons, the de facto
IT manager at UU because he's the only one who understands what he's talking about. Hex has his origins in a device that briefly appears in
Soul Music, created by Ponder Stibbons and some student Wizards in the High Energy Magic building. In this form it was simply a complex network of glass tubes, containing "
ants as carriers of information". The wizards could then use
punched cards to control which tubes the ants can crawl through, enabling it to perform simple mathematical functions, but as time goes on, Hex is increasingly becoming more elaborate.
Past archchancellors •
Alberto Malich, the first archchancellor and founder of UU. He went to the land of
Death when he performed the
Rite of AshkEnte backwards, and remained in
Death's Domain as Death's assistant and butler. He also appeared in
Mort,
Soul Music, and in
Hogfather where he appeared as Pixie Albert to Death's Hogfather. In the film version of
Hogfather he is portrayed by
David Jason. • Chancellor Galder Weatherwax, a distant cousin of
Granny Weatherwax, is chancellor for the first half of
The Light Fantastic. He is the 304th Chancellor of the university. In the film version of
The Colour of Magic he is portrayed by
James Cosmo. • Archchancellor Ymper Trymon is archchancellor for the second half of
The Light Fantastic. In the film version of
The Colour of Magic he is portrayed by
Tim Curry. • Coin the Sourcerer is the archchancellor during
Sourcery. Others include Cutangle (
Equal Rites), Virrid Wayzygoose (
Sourcery), Ezrolith Churn (
Eric), Sloman, who discovered the Special Theory of
Slood, and Preserved Bigger (
Unseen Academicals).
Past students •
Eskarina Smith, known as Esk, is the main character in
Equal Rites, and was the Unseen University's first and only known female graduate. She did not appear again in the series until
I Shall Wear Midnight, in which she was described as being both old and young due to her mastery of
time travel. She becomes a close friend of the adult
Tiffany Aching. Esk is mentioned briefly again in ''
The Shepherd's Crown'' with an (unnamed) son. •
Victor Tugelbend (in
Moving Pictures) •
Adrian Turnipseed (appears in
Soul Music,
The Last Continent,
Hogfather and others). In
Unseen Academicals, Adrian Turnipseed was working for Braseneck College. • Mr Sideney, a member of
Teatime's gang. In the film adaptation of
Hogfather, the character is portrayed by
Nigel Planer.
Past wizards •
Drum Billet, a wizard appearing in
Equal Rites, later reincarnated as an ant living under Unseen University. •
Windle Poons, a very old wizard, first appearing in
Moving Pictures. He died at the age of 130, before returning briefly as a zombie. == See also ==