Dana wrote:

This is from Diana Wynne Jones' very funny The Tough Guide to Fantasyland, which skewers the cliches of wizards'n'wyverns fics.

SMALL MAN can be a very funny or very tiresome TOUR COMPANION, depending on how this kind of thing grabs you. He gambles, he drinks too much, and he always runs away. Since the Rules allow him to make JOKES, he will excuse his behavior in a variety of comical ways. Physically he is stunted and not at all handsome, although he usually dresses flamboyantly. He tends to wear hats with feathers in. You will discover he is very vain. But if you can avoid smacking him, you will come to tolerate if not love him. He will contrive, in some cowardly way, to play a major part of SAVING THE WORLD.

He does appear in a lot of folk tales too: the mischievous humorous thief (e.g. Struwwelpeter), often as an elf, goblin or similar.

Though Vila's not vain (except about his lockpicking skills) - in fact he has quite low self-esteem IMO. Or stunted and ugly. However Trevor Hoyle's first novel, written before the casting was done, had him as exactly that. One wonders if he worked from notes for how they wanted the characters to look. Blake is described fairly accurately, Jenna is tall, slim and dark, Avon is balding with pale eyes - can't imagine it myself.

I'll get the book to quote from. In the holding cells, Vila is described like this:

< Blake came slowly, painfully, back to reality. The face that greeted his return reminded him of a gargoyle. It was small, pinched, swarthy, and contained a pair of eyes that held a mischievous twinkle, despite their expression of apparently sincere concern. >

I bet his eyes were beady and close-set too. Sounds very like the archetype. One of the things I love about Vila is that he didn't match it that closely. Superb casting - MK was wonderfully expressive and brought a lot to the part.

Nico