Wednesday 16 January 2019

Can Mongols Drink?

In Poul Anderson's Time Patrol story, "The Only Game In Town," Manse Everard's captor, Toktai, boasts that he drank twenty fellow Mongols senseless in Karakorum. Nevertheless, Everard incapacitates Toktai and his two guards by sharing with them his twentieth century whisky. Similarly, a commander in SM Stirling's Emberverse either boasts or complains that a Mongol is too mean, tough and hardy to get drunk before passing out in his own vomit. Strength involves knowing our limits, not denying them. Stirling might have remembered Toktai when writing The Sky-Blue Wolves? - or might just have written about the all too common phenomenon of a loud-mouthed drunk.

3 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

I remember both of these examples of Mongol braggadocio! And how Manse Everard reflected that however hardened Mongols were to wine and kvass, they would not be used to such potent drinks as whisky--which was invented only later. And while Prince Dhzambul enjoyed drinking, he also knew his limits (unlike some of his fellow Mongols).

Se

S.M. Stirling said...

I was definitely remembering the "Only Game in Town" story! 8-).

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Mr. Stirling!

And I enjoy watching out for Andersonian allusions in your stories! (Smiles)

Sean