fbpx

Wine and Literature

Wine and Literature. OR. What to drink while reading your favorite books

As never before, time to seek eternal truths in classical literature. Everyone has their favorite books. And your favorite characters. They come to life on the pages, read by more than one generation of book lovers. Our heroes live, travel, love, fight enemies or fate, think, make decisions, act, wait, make friends. But many of them also drink wine! Wine and literature – as for me, is one of the best combinations of this life! Some authors describe the preferences of their heroes in wine so appetizingly that you want to open this or that bottle and continue reading with a glass in your hands. So what to drink while reading your favorite books?

Sherry for Shakespeare

Jerez or sherry is a fortified Spanish wine with a rich history and even richer flavor! Sherry is an amazing complex wine! Usually, you either don’t like it at all or fall in love with it forever. And there much more people in the second group, I have to tell you. At least among the people I trust. One of the connoisseurs of sherry was the famous William Shakespeare. He repeatedly mentioned sherry in his works. For example, in the historical chronicle “Henry IV” there are the following lines:

It ascends me into the brain, dries me there all the foolish and dull and crudy vapours which environ it, makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes, which delivered o’er to the voice, the tongue, which is the birth, becomes excellent wit. The second property of your excellent sherris is the warming of the blood, which before, cold and settled, left the liver white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and cowardice; but the sherris warms it, and makes it course from the inwards to the parts’ extremes.

Champagne for Eugene Onegin

In his famous work “Eugene Onegin”, the classic of Russian literature Alexander Pushkin pays much attention to the description of wine. Onegin loves wine and often drinks it in the pages of a poem.

Entered: and the cork to the ceiling,The wine of the comet splashed;

This is, as we already guessed, the opening of a Champagne bottle process, which was very popular among the Russian aristocracy in the 19th century. But from this short description, we can also even learn about the producer. The fact is that the wine of the comet at that time was called vintage champagne from the Champagne house Veuve Clicquot. In 1814, Nicole Clicquot sent to Russia a secret batch of her beautiful champagne of 1811 vintage (it was called the year of the comet), bypassing the embargo. There was a small label “wine of the comet” on each bottle of that batch. Eyewitnesses claimed that it was champagne of unusual taste, and also very expensive.

вино евгения онегина

German sweet wines reading Remarque

A sad romantic, whose novels I read in my youth, Erich Maria Remarque knew how to select an alcoholic drink for each of his novels. The heroes of his earlier works mainly drink strong drinks: rum, calvados. But it seems that later the writer begins to give preference to wine. So in his novel Time to Live and Time to Die, the heroes drink the best German wines of the Rhine Valley:

“- This is the sun, your honor. Under its rays, grapes ripened in the fall. Now the wine returns these rays…It is like gold and sends golden rays in all directions.

– It’s right.

– You feel it after the first glass. Is not it? Direct sunny juice!

– Even after the first sip. It does not go to the stomach. It rises to the eyes and changes the world.

“You know a lot about wine, sir,” Marabu confidentially leaned toward him. “Over there on the little table on the right is the same wine.” And people lap it like water. They could well have done with Riesling. “

remarque wine

Simple and honest Italian wine for  “A Farewell to Arms”

Ernest Hemingway was also a drinker. In his literary works, alcohol is often inherent. The action of the famous novel takes place on the Italian front. Of course, soldiers drink a lot of wine to alleviate sorrow and the loss of war.

“Wine is a great thing. – I said. “It makes you forget everything bad.”

хемингуэй и вино

My favorite work of Hemingway is “A Moveable feast” about the life of the writer in Paris. France is another country where life without wine is unthinkable. Therefore, there is a lot of different wine in the book. But I will definitely make a separate selection about this book. To be continued. Subscribe to my pages on Facebook and Instagram so you don’t miss anything.

Share
Top
English
Français English
Wine Tasting and Tour