The first person narrator travels on horseback through a dusty Middle Eastern countryside where kaftan-wearing men emerge from brick houses and speak Aramaic or Edomite. He eats pitta and cheese and drinks water although:
"It's hard for a Marklander to be without his morning coffee..." (p. 71)
See previous blog discussions of tea and coffee here.
At the gate of Mirzabad, Persian soldiers:
"...bore old-time muzzle-loading rifles and curved short-swords." (p. 72)
The narrator himself bears "...pistol and broadsword." (ibid.)
Poul Anderson conveys the sense of an ancient past but with some elements of a more recent past. History has diverged at some point. Will the narrator encounter a displaced time traveller? Not in this narrative but we must read on to learn the score.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
What caught my eye was the narrator missing his morning coffee! Plainly, he came from a part of the world prosperous enough that people there could afford to import coffee.
Ad astra! Sean
In our history coffee came to Europe via a chain that went Ethiopia ==> Yemen ==> northern Middle East ==> Europe.
That's from one country to the next closest; I don't see why it should be different in this alternate.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
And I agree. I was thinking it took longer and it was more costly to import coffee in the world of "The House of Sorrows."
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: but coffee seems to be unknown in the Middle East, which is curious.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I recently reread "The House of Sorrows," and you are right, there was no mention at all of coffee being known in Mirzabad/Jerusalem, which is odd. Not even of coffee being so costly only the wealthy could afford it. A rare oversight by Anderson.
Ad astra! Sean
Post a Comment