A colourful way to deter someone from staring at you and, in case of need, to insult your staff.  Stenching mules. Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast books are not only an imaginative masterpiece but also a ready sourcebook of new and inventive invective. 

Your cursing will never be the same again. 

‘Don’t stand there staring at me like stenching mules.’ 

See also our bestellar review of this book, with its lavishly illustrated quote-mosaic, packed with fine phrasing and fresh metaphors.  

Source: Mervyn Peake, Titus Groan, introduction by Anthony Burgess (London: Vintage Books, 1998), p. 310

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