Is "Revenge is a Dish Best Served Cold" really a Pashto proverb?
December 12, 2014 2:48 PM Subscribe
In seeking the origin of the supposedly Klingon proverb from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, I have come across claims online (for example, here and here) that it is a popular central Asian or Afghan saying and not, as asserted elsewhere, a line from the book "Dangerous Liaisons." (See here.) Is this true?
Response by poster: Thanks much but I guess I was wondering more along the lines of whether any Pashto / Central Asia experts thought this sounded credible?
posted by johngoren at 3:33 PM on December 12, 2014
posted by johngoren at 3:33 PM on December 12, 2014
Best answer: This is a stretch, but my memory is that Malala Yousafzai talks about Pashtuns and revenge in I am Malala. I only have the audiobook so I can't easily look but searching using Google Books turns up this quote: "We have a saying: 'The Pashtun took revenge after twenty years and another said it was taken too soon.'" Another: "We Pashtuns know the stone of revenge never decays, and when you do something wrong you will eventually face the music. But when would that be? we continually asked ourselves." So the sentiment certainly seems plausible.
posted by carolr at 4:09 PM on December 12, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by carolr at 4:09 PM on December 12, 2014 [2 favorites]
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Tanizaki at 2:54 PM on December 12, 2014