Havelock Vetinari: Encyclopedia II - Havelock Vetinari - Staying in power

Havelock Vetinari - Staying in power

While he is quite as unpopular as his predecessors, unlike them Lord Vetinari is disturbingly sane and still alive. He has achieved this by ensuring that even though all power-wielding groups in the city dislike him, they dislike each other more. He also carefully arranges matters so that a reality which includes him as Patrician is slightly better than one which does not. The Assassins' Guild no longer accepts contracts on the Patrician - he is the only person besides Samuel Vimes to have been taken off the register. He had the highest official price ever - AM$1 Million. The highest known price paid was AM$3 Million for the Hogfather. His rule of the city is likened in Thud! to a room full of tension, with people bickering and shouting at one another, and "in the middle of it all, one man quietly doing his own thing." Other reasons for the Patrician's continued rule is his mastery of diplomacy and manipulation of human nature, his distant and menacing air, his everpresent calmness and composure which makes other people ill at ease, his abilities as a listener (often people tell him things simply to fill his silence) and of course his very, very good skills as an Assassin. ("Mr. Slant had failed to tell the New Firm about a number of things, and one of them was that Vetinari moved like a snake" (The Truth)).

Vetinari has created (or at least continued) the use of a team of clerks who bring him information on just about everything. The apparent head (or at least one of those seen to most frequently liaise with Vetinari) of this team is Drumknott (The Truth).

Havelock Vetinari - Deposition and restoration

Several attempts have been made on Vetinari's life or position. Shortly after his ascent to office, he was briefly turned into a lizard by a wizard under the influence of a Sourceror. He was deposed for a time in favour of a summoned dragon and locked up in his own dungeons, from which he escaped at his leisure (Guards! Guards!)- the door to his cell was very large and heavy, and was absolutely covered in bars, bolts and lock. On the inside. All that was on the outside was a single lock, the key to which Vetinari had hidden in the cell (he has two mottoes a ruler should remember when building dungeons: "never build a dungeon you wouldn't want to spend the night in yourself" and "never build a dungeon you can't get out of"). He was shot in the leg with a gonne (sic) and now walks with an ebony cane, though only in public (Men at Arms). A year later, he was poisoned with arsenic (Feet of Clay).

During the brief war with Klatch, Vetinari surrendered unconditionally, resulting in his near-exile. However, when the island which was the cause of controversy sank into the ocean (again), all the terms of surrender were off and the Klatchian leader lost an extreme amount of face, which was Vetinari's plan all along. Therefore, Vetinari was congratulated instead of deposed and exiled (Jingo).

Some time later, Vetinari was framed for assault and theft from the city treasury. Again he came a hair's breadth from deposition.(The Truth). None of these events - save poisoning - seem to have fazed him at all.

Havelock Vetinari - Notable events during Vetinari's rule

Vetinari has seen Ankh-Morpork through many unusual events, including the appearance of a Sourceror, a dragon, a war (plus one near-civil war) and an attempt to destroy the Discworld, as well as the metaphysical crises of Moving Pictures, superfluous life force and belief, Music With Rocks In (Soul Music) and one major temporal shatter.

Vetinari has encouraged the growth of the Guilds and public services. The Ankh-Morpork City Watch in particular has flourished, and is an excellent example of the adaptability which has kept Vetinari in office. When he rose to power, the Watch were a bunch of incompetent drunks, and that was just how he wanted it. Now, it is a large, efficient, well-oiled anti-crime machine, and that appears now to be just how he wants it. Ankh-Morpork has given birth to the first newspaper, while the AM-based Grand Trunk Clacks Company established the first efficient international communication service (The Fifth Elephant); more recently, he has pumped public money into revamping the postal service (Going Postal).

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Staying in power", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki