Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are two seminal sword-and-sorcery heroes appearing in stories written by Fritz Leiber (1910–1992). They are the protagonists of what are probably Leiber's best-known stories.
Fafhrd is a tall (seven feet) northern barbarian; Mouser is a small, mercurial thief, once known as Mouse and a former wizard's apprentice. Fafhrd talks like a romantic, but his strong practicality usually wins through, while the cynical-sounding Mouser is prone to showing strains of sentiment at unexpected times. Both are rogues, existing within a decadent world where to be so is a requirement of survival. They spend a lot of time drinking, feasting, wenching, brawling, stealing, and gambling, and are seldom fussy about who hires their swords. But they are humane and—most of all—relish true adventure.
The characters were loosely modelled upon Leiber himself and his friend Harry Otto Fischer (1910–1986). Fischer initially created them in a letter to Leiber in September 1934, naming at the same time their home city of Lankhmar. In 1936, Leiber finished the first Fafhrd and Gray Mouser novella, Adept's Gambit, and began work on a second, The Tale of the Grain Ships. At the same time, Fischer was writing the beginning of The Lords of Quarmall. Adept's Gambit would not see publication until 1947, while The Lords of Quarmall would be finished by Leiber and published in 1964 and The Tale of the Grain Ships would become the prototype for "Scylla's Daughter" (1961) and, later, the novel The Swords of Lankhmar (1968). One of Leiber's motives in creating them was to have a couple of fantasy heroes closer to true human nature than the likes of Howard's Conan the Barbarian or Burroughs's Tarzan.[1]
The stories of the two were only loosely connected until the 1960s, when Leiber organized them into a chronology and added additional material in preparation for paperback publication. Starting as young men, the two meet and lose their female lovers in the same evening, which explains both their friendship and the arrested adolescence of their lifestyles. However, in later stories, the two mature and learn leadership, and eventually settle down with new female partners on the Icelandic-like Rime Isle. Leiber always contemplated continuing the series beyond this point, but died before he managed to do so.
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The tales are for the most part set in the fictional world of Nehwon (although one story takes place on Earth), many of them in and around its greatest city, Lankhmar. It is described as "a world like and unlike our own". Theorists in Nehwon believe that it may be shaped like a bubble, floating in the waters of eternity.
Technology in Nehwon varies between the Iron Age and the medieval. Leiber wrote of Lankhmarts: "They may be likened to the Romans or be thought of as, if I may use such a term, southern medievals." About his Eastern Lands, he wrote "think of Saracens, Arabs, Parthians, Assyrians even. They ride the camel and elephant, and use the bow extensively."[2]
The series includes many bizarre and outlandish characters. The two who most influence—and, some would say, cause the most trouble for—Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are their sorcerous advisors, Ningauble of the Seven Eyes and Sheelba of the Eyeless Face. These two lead the two heroes into some of their most interesting and dangerous adventures.
The first story appeared in Unknown in 1939 and the last in The Knight and Knave of Swords in 1988. Although Leiber credited his friend, Harry Otto Fischer, with the original concepts for the characters, it was Leiber who wrote nearly all the stories. 10,000 words of The Lords of Quarmall were penned by Fischer early in the development of the series; the story was completed by Leiber in 1964. Fischer also wrote "The Childhood and Youth of the Gray Mouser," published in 1978. The stories' style and tone vary considerably, but nearly all contain an often dark sense of humour, which ranges from the subtle and character-based to the Pythonesque. The earlier tales owe as much to Clark Ashton Smith as to Robert E. Howard.
The stories have been collected in the Swords series:
In 2009, Benjamin Szumskyj's Strange Wonders, included the first few chapters of "The Tale of the Grain Ships," written in the 1930s. This unfinished fragment depicts the Gray Mouser in Rome during the reign of the Emperor Claudius.
Several omnibus editions have also been published:
In 1972, Fafhrd and the Mouser began their comics career, appearing in Wonder Woman #202 alongside the title character and Catwoman in a story scripted by award-winning SF writer Samuel R. Delany. In 1973, DC Comics began an ongoing series, Sword of Sorcery, featuring the duo. The title was written by Denny O'Neil and featured art by Howard Chaykin, Walt Simonson and Jim Starlin; the well-received title ran only five issues. Stories included adaptations of "The Price of Pain-Ease", "Thieves' House", "The Cloud of Hate", and "The Sunken Land", as well as original stories.
In 1991, Epic Comics published a four-issue comic book adaptation of seven of the stories: "Ill Met in Lankhmar" (issue 1), "The Circle Curse" and "The Howling Tower" (issue 2), "The Price of Pain Ease" and "Bazaar of the Bizarre" (issue 3), and "Lean Times in Lankhmar" and "When the Sea King's Away" (issue 4). The comics were scripted by Howard Chaykin, who had drawn several issues of the earlier DC title, and pencilled by Mike Mignola, whose Hellboy comic book often has a similar feel to Leiber's work. Mignola also did the jacket covers and interior art for the White Wolf collection. This series was collected by Dark Horse Comics in a trade paperback collection published in March 2007.[4]
Marvel Comics created their own version of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, when they introduced the Vanir Fafnir and his companion Blackrat to the Conan comics. The pairs of characters were very much alike and Roy Thomas, who wrote the original Conan comics, made no secret that it was his intention to create characters that were a tribute to Fritz Leiber's creations.[5]
In 1937, Leiber and his college friend Harry Otto Fischer created a complex wargame set within the world of Nehwon, which Fischer had helped to create. Later, they created a simplified board game entitled simply "Lankhmar" which was released by TSR in 1976. This is a rare case of a game adaptation written by the creators of the stories on which the game is based.
Nehwon, and some of its more interesting inhabitants, are described in the early Dungeons and Dragons supplement Deities and Demigods, and the stories themselves were a significant influence on the Dungeons and Dragons role playing game.
In 1986 Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser were featured in a 1-on-1 Adventure Gamebook set, Dragonsword of Lankhmar. One player controlled Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, who were trying to find a magical sword beneath an altar (just which one, they were not sure) in Lankhmar. The other player controlled assassins from the local thieves' guild, who were trying to kill the famous rogues for operating in the city without permission from the guild.
Fafhrd commonly uses a longsword which he names Graywand. He also carries a poignard named Heartseeker and a short hand-axe which has never been named. The Mouser also fights with a pair of weapons: a rapier called Scalpel and a dirk called Cat's Claw. The latter is balanced for throwing. As the pair are often divested of their property, these are names they apply to any of their appropriate weapons and not names of specific ones.
In Terry Pratchett's The Colour of Magic, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are parodied as Bravd and the Weasel. Although Ankh-Morpork bears more than a passing resemblance to Lankhmar, Pratchett, known for the use of pastiche in his early works, has been quoted as not intending a direct takeoff.[6] Some of the features of similarity (e.g. a thieves' guild, and a general air of degeneracy) may instead be common tropes of fantasy literature, although it could be argued, especially in the case of the thieves' guild, that many of the tropes in question originated with Leiber.
In Issue #77 and #78 of Vertigo Comic's Fables, characters Freddy (Fafhrd) and Mouse (Gray Mouser) are incorporated as local rogues who unleash an Old Sorcerer into the world.
In the Bioware PC game Baldur's Gate, the password to the Thieves' Guild is Fafhrd.
In the Bethesda game Skyrim, two members of the Riften Thieves Guild are named Drahff (an anagram of Fafhrd) and Hewnon Black-Skeever (a rodent similar to a rat or mouse).