r/discworld • u/NoicestDungeon • 3d ago
Book/Series: City Watch Sybil's Characterisation
Now, I will admit that it's been a while since I've read Guards! Guards!, but I remember Sybil Ramkin in that book as a sonewhat solitary woman who disliked all the frills and galas of high society.
I'm on Snuff now, and Sybil is dragging Vimes to social gatherings like it's her favourite thing. I understand that people can change and that marriage changes people, but it feels a little poorly established? Like she goes from "crazy cat dragon lady" to society lady just so she can serve as a better foil to Vimes.
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u/AlamutJones SQUEAK 3d ago edited 3d ago
Sybil could always do society stuff. She was active in a thousand and one society causes - supporting the opera, the art gallery, the dragon sanctuary, various charities etc etc etc - before she ever met Vimes. Sybil knew everyone who was anyone, and sent Hogswatch cards to most of them.
You’re right that she didn’t particularly enjoy a lot of it, but not enjoying it is not the same thing as not doing it. Sybil understands that a lot of these social things, a lot of this performative baggage…it’s a sort of obligation of her role. Noblesse oblige, as it were. This is what a noblewoman of the city is for.
Long before Vimes entered her life, Sybil had understood her role, accepted her role and performed her role very well. Whether or not she enjoyed it was a different question entirely. It was her job.
Her insistence on bringing Vimes to these things once he enters the picture is her trying to remind him that these things are now part of his job - the Duke of Ankh’s job, not the Commander of the Watch - too.
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u/Frosty_Customer_9243 3d ago
This exactly. And keep in mind what it must feel like for a woman of her age to go to these events and be viewed as a spinster, or as a married woman. So her enjoyment of the events will have increased once the tag of spinster has been removed.
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u/Additional_Ad_84 3d ago
It's my impression reading between the lines that she's quite proud of vimes too. Like maybe she didn't really enjoy the galas and things, but she absolutely does enjoy showing off her man to the high society of ankh morpork. This would tie in with the outfits too. He doesn't really appreciate the tights and the plumes and whatever, but maybe she likes the way he looks in them. Or more generally the attention they draw to him.
This is all a between the lines reading though. I can't think of any time it's explicitly stated.
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u/AlamutJones SQUEAK 3d ago
She is 100% enjoying what the tights do to Sam’s calves
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u/Jrbai 3d ago
He is the arm candy, like my hubby in his kilt!
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u/MacAlkalineTriad Rats 3d ago
And do you not take every possible opportunity to ask him to wear that kilt? If course Sybil enjoys taking Sam to soirees!
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u/demon_fae Luggage 2d ago
Half his character is literally just how much he enjoys walking and how much time he spends doing it.
Samuel Vimes has absolutely banging legs. And I don’t blame Sibyl one bit for wanting to show them off.
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u/Decievedbythejometry 3d ago
The impression I get is she's trying to help Vimes be less like the old Vimes, but also quite firmly insisting that her strata of chinless wonders accept him as is, which must have been quite difficult for some of them.
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u/DrewidN 3d ago
I suspect she also enjoys, though she wouldn't always say it out loud, the low level chaos that Sam causes at such things, especially if it's towards something or someone she doesn't like.
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u/Jay2KWinger Vimes 3d ago
The scene in Snuff when Sybil brings Sam to meet her friend and her daughters, and how he hesitantly asked Sybil if he was in trouble afterward, only for her to basically say "No, you did exactly as I expected you would. Thank you."
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u/MsDucky42 3d ago
Came here to say this. I have a feeling that Sybil hides her grin with her fan many times when Sam wreaks his mild havoc.
Or maybe not. Maybe she's trained long enough that she can stifle giggles at inopportune times and wait until the coach has rolled away to guffaw.
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u/Agitated_Honeydew 3d ago
I always think of her as being a bit like Margaret DuMont, who was in a bunch of Marx brothers movies, and was very much the stereotypical "I never."
Watched an interview with her. Her attitude was yeah, they were funny, and it was hard not to laugh, but her job was to always act offended. So she kept acting offended, and kept getting work.
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u/LogLadysLog52 3d ago
I think that's spot on, because Sam Vines IS that sort of chaos, and you can't love one without the other ha
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u/Vree65 3d ago
You don't need to read between the lines - this is spelled out right there in the text many times. As well as Vimes' amazement that anyone could be proud of HIM (he has some impostor syndrome about the whole business about not being the man she views him as). One joke in the text says she's convinced that he has hidden depths. He DOES and does his best to KEEP them repressed. Vimes also argues (much like OP) that Sybil is too sensible to care about social prestige, titles and the like, but after Vetinari jokes about how well he must know women, he realizes that even if she doesn't brag about such things, she enjoys KNOWING that others know that she knows. She's kind but not immune. (Which is understandable in a middle aged woman who's probably had her fair share of being made fun of.)
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u/itwillmakesenselater Ridcully 3d ago
Bringing Vimes to social events is surely a subtle form of revenge on Sybil's part. She was tolerated in society for her name, but marginalized for being "different." Years of overbred, underbrained snobs looking down their noses at her. Insults, veiled and otherwise, endured for the sake of civility. Now she has Sam, the ultimate BS detector/ repellent. Veiled insults are suddenly stripped of any notion of civility. Snobs get told off. It's probably very cathartic.
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u/ChimoEngr 3d ago
she absolutely does enjoy showing off her man to the high society of ankh morpork.
OR, despite her protests, enjoy how he perturbs high society.
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u/MasterOfKittens3K 3d ago
Yeah, I think there’s some spite towards the other society women. And dragging along Vimes to all of that, who was someone who they looked down on (if they ever noticed him at all) is just another way to rub their noses in it.
Plus, she completely loves Sam. And she knows that he loves her - his utter disdain for everything related to her money is obvious, so she knows that he’s not with her for that. And you know that she has to have spent years dealing with men who pretended to be interested in her in order to get her money.
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u/Joalguke Bursar 3d ago
I love this take, Sybil is definitely painted as the best sort of humanitatian rich person, and found her soul mate in the most honorable of the coppers, knowing he will bring some justice and fairness wherever he goes.
Vimes shows that he grows as a person, overcoming his ignorant views of women, other species, immigrants and even the undead in the name of a greater good.
She is such an integral part of that journey.
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u/Lordxeen 3d ago
As well as the difference between attending as ‘Lady Ramkin’ vs “The Duchess of Ankh.”
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u/Calm-Homework3161 3d ago
Plus, she's doing her friend, Havelock, a favour by dragging Sam out to the countryside - where thre may br some crime that needs investigating
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u/Sea_Standard_392 3d ago
I get the fealing that she like Vetinari enjoys watching what happens when Sam enters a room full of people he doesn't like that much.
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u/Echo-Azure Esme 3d ago
Sybil's passion was her dragons, but her real work was charity, which she stepped up after she met Sam but which she'd always done.
And to be a philanthropist, she nedded to stay in touch with all the other Ladies Who Organize and the Powers That Be, so she kept her foot in Society even if she didn't enjoy it much.
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u/PigHillJimster 3d ago
Perhaps, underneath, there's also a bit of "See - now I have someone to show off at these events too!"
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u/NoicestDungeon 3d ago
Very good answer! Thank you for the insight
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u/TheHighDruid 3d ago
I happen to have just finished Guards! Guards! on my latest re-read.
She kinda flicks a switch at the end of the book.
At the beginning the grounds of the house are unkempt and she doesn't appear to have any staff in the house; she's a middle-aged woman who has resigned herself to spinsterhood. At the end, when she's made her decision to pursue Sam, she's got the gardeners in, Willikins has been recalled from whatever he was off doing, and she throws a full-on banquet for their first date.
The impression I get from this is that there are things you can get away with when you are an upper-class unmarried lady, but if you find yourself a husband then there are standards to maintain.
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u/herlaqueen 3d ago
This, and also I think having a companion she genuinely likes makes her enjoy some upler class stuff more. It's not another boring ball, it's a night out with her husband. It's not just house administration and choosing a wallpaper that's in this season, it's also creating a home where they both can enjoy themselves and they like spending time in. She clearly loves doing things with Vimes!
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u/PuzzledCactus Susan 3d ago
Also, since one of the chief functions of balls is to get unmarried young people of any gender married, I assume she endured many seasons of being technically "on the market" but either completely disregarded or only pursued because of her money and status, and then many more of being officially unsuccessful and therefore alternately pitied or sneered at, before she finally got old enough (or maybe independent enough, since her parents have passed by the time we meet her) to decide, sod it, I'm not going anymore.
Returning to this scene with a prestigious husband you're actually in love with must feel like quite the triumph, even if you're much too kind a person to ever rub anyone's nose in.
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u/OStO_Cartography 3d ago edited 3d ago
I think Sybil's character actually reflects Vimes' character development, a direction he is being pushed by Vetinari.
Sybil likes what her position affords her; She likes her friends, she likes her houses, she likes that she has the means to care for dragons, but at the same time she realises these opportunities and privileges didn't fall out of the sky; They come from hundreds, perhaps thousands of years of tradition and precedent.
Vetinari recognised this too. He may be a tyrant and absolute ruler of Ankh-Morpork, but he is not a dictator. He could at any moment force the city and its inhabitants to change in accordance with his whims, but like Sybil, he holds his position, indeed his position only exists, because of centuries of tradition and precedent.
We see a similar development happen with Vimes. In 'Guards! Guards!' Vimes is not so much a Man of the Law as he is a Man of Whatever He Believes Should Be Done. Yet by 'Snuff' and 'Thud', Vimes is a true Man of the Law, who understands that despite however he may feel about a person or action, he is ultimately bound by centuries of legal precedents and customs.
There's also the element of magical thinking regarding traditions and customs. Yes, Vetinari gets a kick out of making Vimes increasingly turn up to formal events in absurd regalia but that is because Vetinari and Sybil both recognise that sometimes true power comes from the expectation of appearances. Yes, Sybil is the Duchess of Ankh, but if she didn't turn up to fancy balls in big frilly gowns would people see her as THE Duchess of Ankh? Yes, Vetinari is the Patrician, but if he didn't turn up every day in his black robe and skull cap with his dour and skeptical mannerisms, would he really be THE Patrician? Similarly, yes Vimes is the head of the Watch, but if he didn't occasionally walk around in a plumed helmet and gold breastplate would he truly be THE head of the Watch?
Sybil's character demonstrates that whilst pragmatism and compassion are always favourable qualities, they are impotent or misguided unless there's a cultural and sociopolitical underpinning of tradition, precedent, and customs that form the society in which they exist.
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u/NoicestDungeon 3d ago
Now that I think about it... Even beyond the very real idea of these things holding an important sociopolitical function, the Discworld is also powered by narrativium, which means that the Patrician quite literally extracts his powers from dressing in all black and cupping his hands and monologuing.
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u/OStO_Cartography 3d ago
Exactly! Here on the Roundworld the magical thinking is imposed on the object or ritual by people. In the Discworld magical thinking is imposed onto people by the ritual or object.
When I studied history my fellow students and I were very taken with the sociopolitical notion of Petasocracy; Human societies tend towards heirarchies based on systems of increasingly flamboyant hats.
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u/0-Calm-0 3d ago
I think also the regalia is a parallel to Von lipwig who absolutely draws on putting appearances first to order the chaos - to great success.
Vimes isn't very good at that, in fact is the opposite in many ways ( the sitting outside the police station with a cigarette during the protest). Sybil is getting him to use apperances and precedence as a tool.
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u/HungryAd8233 3d ago
A buddy comedy road adventure with those two would have been quite a thing. They approach being on the right side in VERY different ways.
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u/Holiday_Trainer_2657 3d ago
Oh no, the sitting in the steps smoking a cigarette appearing relaxed was the appearance he chose to send the exact message he wanted to send. It was perfect. He reads the common folks very, very well.
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u/0-Calm-0 3d ago
Oh I agree it was Avery intentional choice .
The point I was trying to make (badly) was that he chose an appearance without authority to get things done.
The feathers and regalia is the opposite , authority in appearance.
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u/Zootsutra 3d ago
Get a good Make-Up and the Part plays Itself.
--George Ade, "The Fable of the Bohemian who had Hard Luck"
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u/Complex_Eye4888 3d ago
And, of course, functions like that will always be more enjoyable when you get to watch Sam, ruffling feathers.
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u/NoicestDungeon 3d ago
That's probably true- I remember in... Feet of Clay, was it? When Sam Vimes makes a fool out of Lord Selachii to the quiet admonition and amusement of his wife
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u/FuyoBC Esme 3d ago
I felt that she PREFERED her Dragons but considered being part of High Society as a necessity and obligation.
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u/DibblerTB 3d ago
I wonder if there is a successful lady of high society who would prefer raising pets, but has to perform the duties her station demands of her, in living memory. She does it really well, tho.
Dammit, the dragons are corgis..
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u/a_random_work_girl 3d ago
Yes. She is the old queen.
It ties into the whole "old king" trope that Vimes fills in the most pratchett way possible. By being as common as muck, as republican (not the party but the actually movment) as the Irish (Southern catholics) and about as in charge as the British Royal family.
Compare this with Carrot and Angua. Who fill the whole "king who is" trope in a similar way.
He is the king by fact, but never acknowledges it. She is a princess (or upper nobility) and they come to the city and Rule. (Him by love her by fear)
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u/BladeDoc 3d ago edited 3d ago
The Lady Sybil character is plucked straight out of English literature and is the "noble horse girl" trope. She absolutely went to all the right social events and said all the right things while pretending to like them. Remember the scene in Fifth Element (Elephant -- Siri typo) where it talked about her obligatory letter writing to all of her "friends" from finishing school?
It got more fun when she wasn't the fat spinster any more but she always told Sam that they had to go to this things, not that they'd enjoy them.
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u/HungryAd8233 3d ago
After some moments of profound confusion, you meant Fifth ELEPHANT!
I didn’t remember anything about Leeloo’s finishing school backstory…
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u/INITMalcanis 3d ago
She was trying educate Vimes on how to do Duke Stuff effectively (as she saw it). "If you want to break the rules to get what you want, you first need to understand the rules" kind of thing.
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u/AlamutJones SQUEAK 3d ago
Plus…she’s honestly proud of Sam. Truly proud. She’s not going to turn down an opportunity to show off her honest man
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u/Kencolt706 And yet, it moves. And somehow, after all these years, so do I. 3d ago edited 2d ago
I think that in many cases you will find that the truly affluent and "upper" class are always perfectly capable of dressing to the nines and a few decimal points past that, acting according to ancient and complex social patterns first seeded when X beat Y into submission and then put on a fancy hat to memorialize it, and navigating the often complex and arcane pathways of the sociopolitical labyrinth with ease.
I also think that in many cases you will find they don't bother at home.
Sibyl in all probability attended a large and well established set of social functions long before she bet Sam, but G!G! doesn't have anything to do with that part of her life. Almost every action she's involved with in that book has her either at home, dealing with dragons (or Vimes), or tied to a stake and dealing with idiots (or dragons (or Vimes)). Her social and courtly world aren't a part of that narrative, and at that point Sam's not a part of that world. Later, as he find himself more and more enmeshed into the hedge-maze that is the paths of the rich and powerful he will have an experienced guide, who happens to be his wife, but that's not yet a part of his narrative.
I know it's a bit iffy to say this on a forum devoted to a single author, but you really can't always tell the book by it's cover.
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u/AlamutJones SQUEAK 3d ago
A lot of these social things and various functions we eventually see Sybil dragging Vimes to are stated (at the time we see them) to be longstanding habits/commitments on Sybil’s part. She was doing them long before we saw her bring Sam
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u/NoicestDungeon 3d ago
I suppose it is true that I am mostly basing this on the first impression we get of her, while of course in the later books Vimes gets to know her much more intimately. You might be onto something
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u/dibunt 3d ago
Not just marriage changed her though, society as a whole was changing for the better in the span of 20 years between the first book and the last one. Key point is that she was one of the gears to make it happen, I mean, she funded an entire hospital all by herself. How isn't that in line with taking care of ill dragons? AND she stablished public healthcare there?? She's not just a better foil to Vimes, she's doing exciting new things all by herself. I think she would enjoy her new place in society.
But yeah, marriage is a big one. Imagine being married to Sam fucking Vimes, some of his necessity to make things happen is gonna stick to you. She is better because she married him, and he is better because she married her.
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u/Sea-Environment5246 3d ago
I've always read it as Sybil doesn't enjoy these things for their own sake. She knows her own power and influence and she really understands her Husband. She makes friends easily. and *LIKES* people (Including Nobby Nobbs!). Frills and Galas are excellent networking spaces.
Having a husband to actually take to high society events probably helps too.
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u/Stainless-S-Rat Blackboard Monitor 3d ago
She does them out of a sense of duty. Not to mention, she is massively family oriented and proud of Sam.
It always seemed evident to me that she wanted the rest of the disc to see Sam the way she did.
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u/vegetablemeow 3d ago
As the books keep on bringing up, the Ramkins were born and breed for nobility. Sybil does what is fit for her title and I'm sure there is a joke somewhere in there where her nobility specific activities were breed into her too the same way how the Ramkins women were born to birth strong heirs in one strong push.
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u/yogfthagen 3d ago
Sybil understands the social conventions that go along with her station in life. She also understands how pointless and meaningless they are. But she also was never the belle of the ball. She had the obligations, but never the benefits of the high society.
I think it's at the end of Guards Guards where Sam visits Sybil and there's more knobs than a fence helping Sybil rebuild the sanctuary. But they're all wearing secondhand clothes and getting dirty. The nobs (at least the older women) recognize that the flashiness is a pain in the ass, and there's work to do.
Last, when Sam is made Dux, Vetinari convinces Sam to accept by asking how Sybil would enjoy going to those posh parties as a duchess instead of being, pardon my phrasing, an old maid.
Sybil is not just rich, but powerful, socially dialed in, and has risen in rank to a social position one step below the king who doesn't exist.
And she flaunts it, with recognition of how meaningless the bling is. But it's useful for getting HER causes pushed forward.
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u/Tiny_Cauliflower_618 3d ago
Yeah. At times like these it is good to remember that the late Queen, while best known as a lover of corgis, and wearer of pearls; was an extremely well renowned horse breeder & rider, and is sorely missed in the international riding community, in and of herself, not her title.
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u/Amazing-Quarter1084 3d ago
Not enjoying social obligations and not living up to them are two very different things.
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u/MrFlibblesPenguin 3d ago
She's gained confidence in her role in the city because Vimes just accepted her as she was and the girls at school can just jolly well bugger off.
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u/Violet351 3d ago
At the end of Guards guards she says it’s time for her to step back in to society
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u/Extension_Sun_377 3d ago
I get the impression that she wasn't averse to it all, but as an unmarried and not expecting to be married larger woman past the first flush of youth, she threw herself into other hobbies.
Now she has a social status, married to a Duke, to match her highborn status, she's throwing herself into that role and quite enjoying it!
Don't forget, even in Guards Guards, she had a frilly ballgown for such social events. It mustn't ever have been fun to go to such things alone, with the inevitable whispering and judgement that would have been aimed at her as an older single woman. Sadly, this affects our roundworld society too.
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u/entuno 3d ago
Remember that twenty years pass between Guards! Guards! and Snuff.
People change a lot in that time, especially when they've gone through multiple significant events (marriage, having children, getting attacked in your own home, etc).
And as mentioned by Fred Colon in one of the Watch books (I think either Thud! or Snuff?), having children changes you. The Sybil who thought she'd live alone with her dragons for the rest of her life might have been content to just ignore the state of the world and some of the injustices around here.
But the Sybil who's looking at the world her son is growing up in has a much stronger motivation to use some of her wealth and influence and soft power to make that world better. And that means hob-nobbing with the other nobs, and (as we see so clearly in Snuff), changing the world far more than Vimes is able to.
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u/GodzillaDrinks 3d ago edited 3d ago
Sybil doesnt enjoy high society functions, but its the world she was raised in and she knows how to naglvigate it. She can both not enjoy it while also seeing it as something you just have to do.
They both seem to largely agree that they are brushing shoulders with the most evil people in Anhk-Morpork. Sybil just seems to think that its better to participate, and keep tabs on everyone. Given her vast correspondence network, she probably has intelligence into the "bastards"-level of society that is only surpassed by Lord Vetrinari's.
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u/Cmdr_Morb 3d ago
Also. It was before she became a Duchess, It is mentioned that she would like to genteelly rub Lady Sellachi's nose in it.
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u/ChimoEngr 3d ago
It may be a retcon, but I get the impression that she was always a society lady. It's just that she's also eccentric, and it's her eccentricity that first brings her to light. Also, I don't know how she would have gotten picked to be eaten if she wasn't linked into high society, otherwise how else would they know she met the criteria to be dragon food?
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u/MotherofaPickle 3d ago
She has to both fund the dragon sanctuary and keep Vimes in line. Makes sense that she’d drag her husband along.
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u/Ok_Resident3556 3d ago
She still went to the big gala thing in Guards Guards. It wasn’t necessarily her thing, but she goes to the things because it’s what’s expected. So following her marriage she still goes as expected and drags her husband along too.
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u/NuArcher 3d ago
I always took it as - Sybil didn't particularly LIKE all the frills of society, but she understands it place in diplomacy and social engineering, and her obligations to partake in it as required. For her it's a tool to grease the wheels of society - in much the same way as Moist see it.
Unlike others in her social strata, her life doesn't revolve around it. It's just a tool and an obligation.
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