Death and Literature

This is the Death of Rats. He (she?) is one of my favourite literary characters from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.

On the disc, Death is a character that shows up wherever there is, well, death. Which, like in our world, is pretty much everywhere, all the time. He is the standard Anthropomorphic Personification of death, which is to say, he looks like a skeleton, wearing a black robe and carrying a scythe.

Since he is so busy, it stands to reason that he needs an assistant. So the Death of Rats takes care of ushering smaller souls into the afterlife. Not just rats, but mice, small mammals, insects, you get the idea. And like the bigger Death, he is a rat skeleton wearing a robe and carrying a scythe. Because standards are important.


This is Atticus, named for a literary character. When we named him after the protagonist in "To Kill Mockingbird" we didn't expect he would take the title so literally.
Like the Death of Rats, he has decided it is his job to help usher smaller souls into the afterlife. At first it was a few house mice, then field mice, then several squirrels, a vole, a chipmunk, a bat, countless crickets and spiders and just today, 2 birds.
I love my cat, but he is starting to scare me.