Reaper Man: (Discworld Novel 11) (Discworld Novels)

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The Auditors of Reality are beings who watch the Discworld to ensure everything obeys The Rules. As Death starts developing a personality the Auditors feel that he does not perform his Duty in the right way. They send him to live like everyone else. Assuming the name "Bill Door", he works as a farm hand for the elderly Miss Flitworth. Translation: Maaierstijd Maaierstijd ("Reaping-Time", possibly also a pun on "Majesteit (Majesty)")[Dutch] ( 1995)

Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett | Waterstones

Albert also makes an appearance in the computer game Discworld 2: Missing Presumed...!?, voiced by Nigel Planer. Sergeant Colon of the Ankh-Morpork City Guard was on duty. He was guarding the Brass Bridge, the main link between Ankh and Morpork. From theft. Death has been voiced in all five BBC Radio adaptations of Discworld novels. Geoffrey Whitehead played the part in the adaptation of Mort, and also in Episode1 of Eric. John Rowe played him in The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents, and Michael Kilgarriff voiced Death in Episode4 of Small Gods. In both Guards! Guards! and Wyrd Sisters, Death is credited as being played by himself (In Guards! Guards! he is actually voiced by Stephen Thorne who also played Sergeant Colon). In The Light Fantastic, Rincewind overhears Twoflower teaching the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, (Death, Famine, Pestilence and War) how to play bridge. At one point, War calls out Death with " Mort" but we later learn that the only people in the room (other than Twoflower) were Death, Famine, Pestilence and War. The name might be a possible reason as to why Death chose Mort as his apprentice especially as, when Mort first introduces himself to Death by name, Death's reply is What a coincidence. Death has appeared in every Discworld novel, with the exception of The Wee Free Men and Snuff, and had a possible cameo at the end of Johnny and the Dead (the character was not identified, but spoke in unquoted small caps as Death does in the rest of the series). The Discworld books in which Death is a leading character, starting with Mort in 1987, are:

In the same way that his granddaughter, Susan, has been described as " Helpfulness Personified" [7] in terms of her personality, Death, by his own admission, could very well be described as 'Duty Personified' in terms of personality; in Hogfather, in a discussion with Albert, Death comments If I had a first name, ' Duty' would be my middle name. He does not cause people to die, nor does he concern himself with their goodness or badness in life; it is simply his job to collect their souls at the appointed time. The first book in the Discworld series- The Colour of Magic-was published in 1983. Some elements of the Discworld universe may reflect this. After the events of Mort, Mort leaves Death's service and marries Ysabell. The couple are given the title of Duke and Duchess of Sto Helit, and they later become the parents of Susan Sto Helit. They subsequently meet their end after a freak accident sends their carriage plunging into a ravine, as revealed in Soul Music. They had discussed this with Death and had turned down his offer to extend the duration of their existence by letting them stay in his domain, on the grounds that it would not be the same as actually lengthening their lives. Belief is one of the most powerful organic forces in the multiverse. It may not be able to move mountains, exactly. But it can create someone who can.

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The Death of Rats more easily finds ways around the rules than Death does, and has assisted Susan in Soul Music, Hogfather, and Thief of Time. He sometimes travels with a talking raven named Quoth who also acts as his translator.

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The ' Bill Door' sections of this novel have many parallels with classic Westerns, e.g. High Plains Drifter. In the mythology of the Changeling Clan in The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents the Death of Rats is known as the Bone Rat. The landscape was snow and green ice on broken mountains. These weren't old mountains, worn down by time and weather and full of gentle ski slopes, but young, sulky, adolescent mountains. They held secret ravines and merciless crevices. One yodel out of place would attract, not the jolly echo of a lonely goatherd, but fifty tons of express-delivery snow.” Belief sloshes around in the firmament like lumps of clay spiralling into a potter's wheel. That's how gods get created, for example. They clearly must be created by their own believers, because a brief resume of the lives of most gods suggests that their origins certainly couldn't be divine. They tend to do exactly the things people would do if only they could, especially when it comes to nymphs, golden showers, and the smiting of your enemies.” The Rite of AshkEnte (also Ashk'Ente or Ash'Kente) is the ancient magic ritual that summons and binds Death into a circle and prevents him from leaving until invited to do so by the summoning wizard. This may be wishful thinking on the part of the wizards as, in Eric, Death appears outside the circle, behind the wizards, and in Reaper Man a wizard comments that he believes Death only stays in the circle for the look of the thing. The Rite is not tuned to Death himself, but rather whoever happened to be doing the job; Mort (then Death's apprentice) was almost forced to respond to the summons, and Susan Sto Helit (his granddaughter) was summoned and subsequently bound. The rite does not appear to apply to Death himself, although he may just appear out of politeness.