"Boasting" may not be, but recounting one's deeds as a form of introduction, where honesty is valued - well, it's like lying on a CV. Get caught at it, you're in deep doodoo.
> I�d agree also that people would expect inflation
> and would admire
> most the person who sticks closest to the truth and
> makes it sound best.
But you don't need inflation to make it sound good. Or lack of inflation to make it sound bad.
hmm, let's try a quick writing exercise, I'm not much good at this boasting thing, but if I borrow from people who are....
"so it were three years back, no, four, yes, that's right, four, and a dangerous long journey too, though not as bad as coming back, but anyway, yes, that's when I got this scar, see, when the third man's spear caught me right under there... what? Yes, we got the woman back. And burnt their place down."
Oh dear.
"Chief's bint got snatched by a younger man. We went and got her back, killed the oath-breaker, sacked the city."
Well, it's coherent and accurate, I suppose. Sounds like a Humakti "boast" to me, and a Hu the Silent one at that.
"Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans. Many a brave soul did it send hurrying down to Hades,....." and on, and on.... I hope that skald got well-paid.
Or there's deliberate ironic under-description. "High King wanted us to raise a united army of all the Achaeans, sail the biggest fleet we'd ever seen across the oceans despite the gods curse, sack the greatest city in the world and defeat all its allies, and deal with any gods that got in the way, to get some woman back. So after we'd done that...."
Of course, dropping casual references in a different story can be quite effective, if your audience knows what you mean.
"Tell me, O Muse, of the man of many devices, who wandered full many ways after he had sacked the sacred citadel of Troy"... as one does, before breakfast, right?
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