Online Encyclopedia
Johnny Maxwell
Johnny Maxwell is a fictional character in a series of three children's books by Terry Pratchett. He is a young boy (twelve in the first book, but a teenager in the later ones), living in the typical late-20th-century English town of Blackbury (also the setting of Pratchett's Truckers).
Johnny has a difficult home life. Over the course of the three books, his parents split up, and he and his mother move in with his grandfather. This may be why he starts seeing things no-one else sees, including an alien surrender party, ghosts and a time travelling bag-lady. On the other hand, it is possible he sees them because they are actually there, and he lacks the filters that stops most people noticing how amazing the world is (a favourite theme of Pratchett's).
Apart from this tendency, Johnny is almost unnaturally normal. His friend Kirsty often gets exasperated by his tendency to simply accept that strange things happen to him, rather than doing something about it. He has a strong sense of fair play, which leads to him fighting for what's right, even when he has no idea what's going on.
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The Gang
Johnny has a sort of gang, consisting of the kids who hang around with each other because they don't fit into any of the school cliques. They are:
- Wobbler. Johnny's best friend. He is overweight and heavily into computers, although not actually very good with them. Wants to be a nerd, but they wouldn't let him join. It is his considered opinion that Johnny is mental. His real name is Steven.
- Bigmac. An asthmatic skinhead, who is deeply embarrassed by his instinctive grasp of mathematics. He lives with his brother in a rundown tower block on the edge of Blackbury. He is not exactly a criminal, but has a confused grasp of car ownership. His real name is Simon.
- Yo-less. A West Indian boy, so nicknamed by Johnny, because he doesn't say "Yo!". Interested in Star Trek, train spotting, Morris dancing and brass band music. His reaction to those who are surprised a black kid has such "uncool" hobbies varies from amusement to irritation. When faced with genuine racism, he has a brittle anger that manifests itself in cold, almost emotionlessly delivered sarcasm.
- Kirsty. Also known as Sigourney, Kimberly, Klytemnestra and Kassandra. Unlike the rest of the gang, Kirsty is a highly organised person who knows exactly where she's going in life. She is highly intelligent, but has very poor people skills, something she views as a character flaw in everyone else. She is trying to get Johnny's life organised, since he is clearly incapable of doing it himself, but hasn't realised he doesn't especially want his life organised. He finds her very easy to talk to, since she never listens. Unlike her most obvious Discworld counterparts, Susan Sto Helit and Granny Weatherwax, Kirsty has a tendency to romanticise things hidden beneath her practicality and finds Johnny's down-to-Earth attitude to things almost as annoying as his lack of direction.
The novels
The Johnny Maxwell books are:
Other media
In 1995 a serial based on Johnny and the Dead was made for Children's ITV. Johnny was played by Andrew Falvery .
In 1996 BBC Radio 4 dramatised Only You Can Save Mankind. Johnny was played by Tim Smith .
"I just see things other people don't see"
Regarding whether the things that happen to Johnny really do happen or are all a matter of perception, as Johnny escapes his problems by projecting fantasy onto reality, Pratchett has said:
I can't be having with that pernicious rubbish . . . To Johnny it's all real, and that's what counts . . . He deals with all the problems on their own terms and half the time he's projecting reality onto fantasy. . . . So: is what happens in the books real? Yes. Does it all happen in Johnny's head? Yes.
- alt.fan.pratchett, 22/02/1997.