Quotes about wine

A collection of quotes on the topic of alcohol, wine, likeness, drink.

Best quotes about wine

“Beer is made by men, wine by God.”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

“You've been nipping at cook's wine!!”

Tamora Pierce (1954) American writer of fantasy novels for children

“Give me some more wine, because life is nothing.”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

Source: Poems of Fernando Pessoa

“Wine is sunlight, held together by water.”

Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) Italian mathematician, physicist, philosopher and astronomer

His description of wine, as quoted in Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo (1957) by Stillman Drake, p. 5
Other quotes
Variant: Light held together by moisture.

“Friendship is the wine of life.”

Edward Young (1683–1765) English poet

“Language is wine upon the lips.”

Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English writer

“When the wine goes in, strange things come out.”

Friedrich Schiller Wallenstein

Act II, sc. v
Wallenstein (1798), Part I - Die Piccolomini (The Piccolomini)

“I called the Navab's wine blood,”

Laxmi Prasad Devkota (1909–1959) Nepali poet

Lunatic. 5
पागल (The Lunatic)
Context: I called the Navab's wine blood, the painted whore a corpse, and the king a pauper. I attacked Alexander with insults, and denounced the so-called great souls. The lowly I have raised on the bridge of praise to the seventh heaven. Your learned pandit is my great fool, your heaven my hell, your gold my iron, friend! Your piety my sin. Where you see yourself as brilliant I find you a dolt. Your rise, friend-my decline. That's the way our values are mixed up, friend! Your whole world is a hair to me. Oh yes, friend, I'm moonstruck through and through- moonstruck! That's just the way I am.

“Wine is good, but water is preferable at table.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), I Philosophy

“Be careful to trust a person who does not like wine.”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

Written in a letter to Francois Lafargue in Bordeaux, 12 November 1866 as published in MECW Volume 42, p. 334. as "That a man who does not love wine will never be good for anything," which was a restating of the phrase wine, women and song that was attributed to Martin Luther at that time.
Source: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1866/letters/66_11_12.htm

Quotes about wine

“I’d much rather eat pasta and drink wine then be a size zero.”

Sophia Loren (1934) Italian actress

Drink

“I'm nobody. I'm a tramp, a bum, a hobo. I'm a boxcar and a jug of wine, and a straight razor if you get too close to me.”

Charles Manson (1934–2017) American criminal and musician

Interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqrqaPThCmI

“To the question what wine he found pleasant to drink, he replied, "That for which other people pay."”

Diogenes of Sinope (-404–-322 BC) ancient Greek philosopher, one of the founders of the Cynic philosophy

Diogenes Laërtius, vi. 54
Quoted by Diogenes Laërtius

People, Drink, Question

“Give me books, French wine, fruit, fine weather and a little music played out of doors by somebody I do not know.”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Books, Music, Weather

“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread — and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness —
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!”

Omar Khayyám (1048–1131) Persian poet, philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer

Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse — and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness —
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.
FitzGerald's first edition (1859)
A book, a woman, and a flask of wine:
The three make heaven for me; it may be thine
Is some sour place of singing cold and bare —
But then, I never said thy heaven was mine.
As translated by Richard Le Gallienne (1897)
Give me a flagon of red wine, a book of verses, a loaf of bread, and a little idleness. If with such store I might sit by thy dear side in some lonely place, I should deem myself happier than a king in his kingdom.
As translated by Justin McCarthy (1888).
The Rubaiyat (1120)

Books, Singing

“I have eaten your bread and salt.
I have drunk your water and wine.
The deaths ye died I have watched beside
And the lives ye led were mine.”

Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) English short-story writer, poet, and novelist

Prelude, Stanza 1.
Departmental Ditties and other Verses (1886)

Death, Water

“Wine enters through the mouth,
Love, the eyes.
I raise the glass to my mouth,
I look at you,
I sigh.”

W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) Irish poet and playwright

Love

“I felt once more how simple and frugal a thing is happiness: a glass of wine, a roast chestnut, a wretched little brazier, the sound of the sea. Nothing else.”

Nikos Kazantzakis book Zorba the Greek

Source: Zorba the Greek

Happy, Sea, Happiness

“I made public the resolution to abstain from wine, which had been hidden in the treasury of my breast The victorious servants, in accordance with the illustrious order, dashed upon the earth of contempt and destruction the flagons and the cups, and the other utensils in gold and silver, which in their number and their brilliance were like the stars of the firmament They dashed them in pieces, as, God willing! soon will be dashed the gods of the idolaters, - and they distributed the fragments among the poor and needy.”

Babur (1483–1530) 1st Mughal Emperor

Babur-Nama, translated into English by A.S. Beveridge, pp. 554-5. https://archive.org/stream/baburnama017152mbp#page/n623/mode/2up/search/dashed Also cited in Harsh Narain, The Ayodhya Temple Mosque Dispute: Focus on Muslim Sources

God, Star, Victory

“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread — and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness —
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!”

Edward FitzGerald (1809–1883) English poet and writer

Books, Singing

“I excused myself as soon as I finished eating, and boy did I stuff myself on that meal. I then walked outside onto the beach. The wine had long since gone to my head, making me feel a sense of dizzy invigoration. I started walking along the shore, taking in the magnificence of the gentle, moonlit ocean. It was so… romantic. I kept walking and walking with no destination in mind. The romance of it all filled me with despair and longing. I wanted a girlfriend to experience that moment with me, but no girl wanted to be my girlfriend. The only thing I could do was imagine how heavenly it would be to have a beautiful girl by my side. It is such a shameful tragedy.”

Elliot Rodger (1991–2014) American spree killer

I ended up walking for two hours, and at the end of it I was crying to myself because I felt so sad.
My Twisted World (2014), Thoughts at 19, Longing

Beauty, Feeling, Imagination, Girl

“And, when night
Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons
Of Belial, flown with insolence and wine.”

John Milton book Paradise Lost

Source: Paradise Lost

Night

“Anni, amori e bicchieri di vino, nun se contano mai.”’ ‘“Years, lovers and glasses of wine; these things must not be counted.”

Anthony Capella (1962) British writer

Source: The Food of Love

Lovers

“What a strange machine man is! You fill him with bread, wine, fish, and radishes, and out comes sighs, laughter, and dreams.”

Nikos Kazantzakis book Zorba the Greek

Source: Zorba the Greek (1946), Ch. 23

Dreams, Fish, Laughter

“He who loves not wine, women and song remains a fool his whole life long.”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

Variant: He who loves not Wine, Women and Song
Remains a fool his whole life long

Love, Life, Women, Fools

“Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine,
Yet let's be merry: we'll have tea and toast;
Custards for supper, and an endless host
Of syllabubs and jellies and mince-pies,
And other such ladylike luxuries.”

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) English Romantic poet

Letter to Maria Gisborne (1820), l. 302

Drink, Tea

“We are all mortal until the first kiss and the second glass of wine.”

Eduardo Galeano book The Book of Embraces

somos todos mortales hasta el primer beso y el segundo vaso
The Book of Embraces (1991)

Kiss

“Of all the fathers, as many as you can name, not one has ever spoken about the sacrament as these fanatics do. None of them uses such an expression as, 'It is simply bread and wine,' or, 'Christ’s body and blood are not present.' Yet since this subject is so frequently discussed by them, it is impossible that they should not at some time have let slip such an expression as, 'It is simply bread,' or, 'Not that the body of Christ is physically present,' or the like, since they are greatly concerned not to mislead the people; actually, they simply proceed to speak as if no one doubted that Christ’s body and blood are present. Certainly among so many fathers and so many writings a negative argument should have turned up at least once, as happens in other articles; but actually they all stand uniformly and consistently on the affirmative side.”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

That These Words of Christ, 'This is My Body' Still Stand Firm Against the Fanatics, 1527, in Luther's Works, Word and Sacrament III, 1961, Fortress Press, , volume 37, p. 54. http://books.google.com/books?ei=PxdBTeK6F4PogQe9lKizAw&ct=result&id=J-0RAQAAIAAJ&dq=%22Nicodemus%2C+joseph%2C+Paul%22&q=%22Still+Stand+Firm+Against+the+Fanatics%22#search_anchor This work appeared in vol. 2 of the Wittenberg ed. of Luther's Works (in German) and was later translated into Latin by Matthew Judex (Matthaeum Iudicem) under the title: Defensio τοῦ ρητοῦ Verborum Cenae: Accipite, Comedite: Hoc est Corpus Meum: Contra Phanaticos Sacramentariorum Spiritus. http://solomon.tcpt.alexanderstreet.com/cgi-bin/asp/philo/cpt/getobject.pl?c.121:1.cpt Luther's Latin: “Nullus ex patribus, quorum infinitus est numerus, de Sacramento sic loquutus est, ut Sacramentarii. Nam nemo ex iis talibus verbis utitur Tantum panis & vinum est: Vel Corpus & Sanguis Christi non adestProfecto non est credibile, nec possibile cum toties ab iis res ista agatur & repetatur, quod non aliquando, vel semel tantum excidissent haec verba. Est merus Panis, aut, non quod Christi corpus corporaliter adsit, aut his similia, cum tamen multum referat ne homines seducantur, Sed omnes praecise ita loquuntur, quasi nullus dubitet, quin ibi praesto sit corpus & sanguis Christi. Sane ex tot patribus, & tot scriptis, ab aliquibus, vel saltem ab uno potuisset negativa sententia proferri, ut in aliis articulis usitatum & frequens est, si non sensissent, corpus & sanguinem Christi vere inesse. Verum omnes concordes & constantes uno ore affirmatium proferunt.” See Luther's Opera Omnia, Wittenberg ed., (1558), vol., 7, p. 391. http://books.google.com/books?id=jrpjO-K_kQYC&pg=PR10&dq=Accipitae+Hoc+%22corpus+meum%22+luther&hl=en&ei=9iFBTeOqIonbgQeJ4IXmAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=coenae&f=false

People, Time, Christ

“I lift my heart as spring lifts up
A yellow daisy to the rain;
My heart will be a lovely cup
Altho' it holds but pain.

For I shall learn from flower and leaf
That color every drop they hold,
To change the lifeless wine of grief
To living gold.”

Sara Teasdale Rivers to the Sea

"Alchemy"
Rivers to the Sea (1915)

Pain, Spring, Heart, Learning

“The Mad Hatter: "Would you like some wine?"
Alice: "Yes…"
The Mad Hatter: "We haven't any and you're too young.”

Lewis Carroll book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Source: Alice in Wonderland

Madness

“There are days when solitude, for someone my age, is a heady wine that intoxicates you with freedom, others when it is a bitter tonic, and still others when it is a poison that makes you beat your head against the wall.”

Colette (1873–1954) 1873-1954 French novelist: wrote Gigi

Freedom (1908)
Source: Oeuvres complètes en seize volumes

Age, Solitude, Freedom

“Sorrow can be alleviated by good sleep, a bath and a glass of wine”

Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican scholastic philosopher of the Roman Catholic Church

Sleep

“Accept what life offers you and try to drink from every cup. All wines should be tasted; some should only be sipped, but with others, drink the whole bottle.”

Paulo Coelho book Brida

Source: Brida

Life, Drink

“Always acknowledge a fault frankly. This will throw those in authority off their guard and give you opportunity to commit more.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

More Maxims of Mark (1927) edited by Merle Johnson

“My books are water; those of the great geniuses is wine. Everybody drinks water.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Source: Notebook

Books, Drink, Water

“I think it would dismay them to know what it takes to feed you. Not to mention that you could empty their cellars of beer and wine in a single night.' Eragon said. Saphira sniffed.”

Christopher Paolini book Eldest

Source: Eldest

Beer, Thinking, Night

“You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.”

Derek Walcott (1930–2017) Saint Lucian–Trinidadian poet and playwright

"Love after Love"
Source: "A Far Cry from Africa" (1962), Collected Poems, 1948-1984 (1986)

Love, Life, Heart

“Wine comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That's all we shall know for truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift the glass to my mouth,
I look at you, and I sigh.”

W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) Irish poet and playwright

A Drinking Song http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/1399/ The Green Helmet and Other Poems (1910)

Love, Truth

“A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition”

Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) English short-story writer, poet, and novelist

Books

“We are born at a given moment, in a given place, and like vintage years of wine, we have the qualities of the year and of the season in which we are born.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Season

“High and fine literature is wine, and mine is only water; but everybody likes water.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Literature, Water

“I pray you, do not fall in love with me, for I am falser than vows made in wine.”

William Shakespeare As You Like It

Source: As You Like It

Love

“And I am all the things I have ever loved: scuppernong wine, cool baptisms in silent water, dream books and number playing.”

Toni Morrison (1931–2019) American writer

Love, Books, Dreams, Water

“I imagine hell like this: Italian punctuality, German humour and English wine.”

Peter Ustinov (1921–2004) English actor, writer, and dramatist

Imagination, Hell

“I love everything that's old: old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wines.”

Oliver Goldsmith book The Vicar of Wakefield

She Stoops to Conquer (1771), Act I
Source: The Vicar of Wakefield

Birthday, Love, Books, Time

“The Duke soon imitated his old friend's little infamy and wagered that, enormous as Invictus' prick might be, he could calmly down three bottles of wine while lying embuggered upon it.”

Marquis de Sade book The 120 Days of Sodom

Le duc imita bientôt avec Bande-au-ciel la petite infamie de son ancien ami et il paria, quoique le vit fût énorme, d'avaler trois bouteilles de vin de sens froid pendant qu'on l'enculerait.
The First Day
The 120 Days of Sodom (1785)

Lying

“New weapons require new tactics. Never put new wine into old bottles.”

Heinz Guderian (1888–1954) German general

As quoted in Cavalry from Hoof to Track (2009) by Roman Jarymowycz, Ch. 16 : Cold Warhorse: Pegasus ex Machina

“I am not dreaming about Bollywood as of now but if I get a role in a film, I am open to doing it. I am not obsessed with the idea of being a part of Bollywood. I am happy with television. Television, today, isn’t just bread and butter; it is wine and cheese. TV actors are very well paid, happy and go abroad to spend their holidays. I do not just like TV, I love it.”

Sukirti Kandpal (1987) Indian actress

On Bollywood and Television http://www.tellychakkar.com/tv/interviews/television-today-isnt-just-bread-and-butter-also-wine-and-cheese-sukirti-kandpal/

Love, Dreams, Idea, Holiday

“I feel how inside of me word follows word and thought follows thought, growing to the last act of creation. Holy hour of bringing forth, you are pain and pleasure, and a longing for form, image and essence. I am only the instrument that God uses to sing his song. I am only the vessel that nature smilingly fills with new wine.”

Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945) Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister

Ich fühle, wie in mir sich wachsend Wort an Wort, Gedanke an Gedanke reiht zum letzten Akt der Schöpfung. Heilige Stunde des Gebärens, Schmerz bist du und Lust und eine Sehnsucht nach Form, Gestalt und Wesen. Ich bin nur Instrument, darauf der alte Gott sein Lied singt. Ich bin nur harrendes Gefäß, in das Natur den neuen Wein mit Lächeln füllt.
Michael: a German fate in diary notes (1926)

God, Pain, Pleasure, Feeling

“For ourselves, who are ordinary men and women, let us return thanks to Nature for her bounty by using every one of the senses she has given us; vary our state as much as possible; turn now this side, now that, to the warmth, and relish to the full before the sun goes down the kisses of youth and the echoes of a beautiful voice singing Catullus. Every season is likeable, and wet days and fine, red wine and white, company and solitude. Even sleep, that deplorable curtailment of the joy of life, can be full of dreams; and the most common actions—a walk, a talk, solitude in one’s own orchard—can be enhanced and lit up by the association of the mind. Beauty is everywhere, and beauty is only two finger’s-breadth from goodness.”

Virginia Woolf The Common Reader

"Montaigne" http://teaching.quotidiana.org/essays/Woolf_Montaigne.html The Common Reader (1925)

Life, Women, Men, Youth

“Being a CEO is the nuts! A whole jumble of thoughts come to mind: Over the top. Wild. Fun. Outrageous. Crazy. Passion. Perpetual motion. The give-and-take. Meetings into the night. Incredible friendships. Fine wine. Celebrations. Great golf courses. Big decisions in the real game. Crises and pressure. Lots of swings. A few home runs. The thrill of winning. The pain of losing. It's as good as it gets! You get paid a lot, but the real payoff is in the fun.”

Jack Welch (1935) American executive: General Electric CEO

Source: Jack: Straight from the Gut (2001), Ch. 24.

Pain, Friendship, Home, Game

“If I had a hammer, I'd build a city on stilts so my feet would stay dry when God's wine glass tilts. If I had a shovel, I'd dig a hole in the dirt and I'll be hiding when his drunken stupor lands upon earth”

Aesop Rock (1976) American rapper

"Tugboat Complex" from the album Labor Days. Archived at " The Original Hip-Hop (Rap) Lyrics Archive http://ohhla.com/anonymous/aesoprck/rm_bside/tugboat.rck.txt," Accessed May 22, 2014.

God

“From of old, amid the rage of robbery and blood-lust, it came to wise men's consciousness that the human race was suffering from a malady which necessarily kept it in progressive deterioration. Many a hint from observation of the natural man, as also dim half-legendary memories, had made them guess the primal nature of this man, and that his present state is therefore a degeneration. A mystery enwrapped Pythagoras, the preacher of vegetarianism; no philosopher since him has pondered on the essence of the world, without recurring to his teaching. Silent fellowships were founded, remote from turmoil of the world, to carry out this doctrine as a sanctification from sin and misery. Among the poorest and most distant from the world appeared the Saviour, no more to teach redemption's path by precept, but example; his own flesh and blood he gave as last and highest expiation for all the sin of outpoured blood and slaughtered flesh, and offered his disciples wine and bread for each day's meal:—"Taste such alone, in memory of me." … Perhaps the one impossibility, of getting all professors to continually observe this ordinance of the Redeemer's, and abstain entirely from animal food, may be taken for the essential cause of the early decay of the Christian religion as Christian Church. But to admit that impossibility, is as much as to confess the uncontrollable downfall of the human race itself.”

Richard Wagner (1813–1883) German composer, conductor

Part II
Religion and Art (1880)

Men, World, Religion, Food

“I am tipsy after my
own feelings
themselves have become wine.
I forget myself, world and all.”

Suman Pokhrel (1967) Nepali poet, lyricist, playwright, translator and artist

The Tajmahal and my Love http://www.best-poems.net/love_poems/the_taj_mahal_amp_my_love.html/ From Poetry

World, Feeling, Forgetting

“The murderer smiles palely in wine,
Death's horror grips the sick.
Excoriated and naked, the nun prays
Before the Savior's agony on the cross.

The mother sings quietly in sleep.
Peacefully the child looks into the night
With eyes that are completely truthful.
In the whorehouse laughter rings.

By candlelight down in the cellar hole
The dead one paints with white hand
A grinning silence on the wall.
The sleeper whispers still.”

Georg Trakl (1887–1914) austrian poet

"Romance in the Night"

Death, Truth, Smile, Laughter

“Music is the cup which holds the wine of silence. Sound is that cup, but empty. Noise is that cup, but broken.”

Robert Fripp (1946) English guitarist, composer and record producer

“The Vinyl Solution.” in Musician, Player, and Listener 24 (April-May 1980): 34.
Elsewhere

Music, Silence

“I rather like bad wine," said Mr. Mountchesney; "one gets so bored with good wine.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Book 1, chapter 1.
Books, Coningsby (1844), Sybil (1845)

“When I spoke about Bond with Fleming, he said that when the character was conceived, Bond was a very simple, straightforward, blunt instrument of the police force, a functionary who would carry out his job rather doggedly. But he also had a lot of idiosyncrasies that were considered snobbish -- such as a taste for special wines, et cetera. But if you take Bond in the situations that he is constantly involved with, you see that it is a very hard, high, unusual league that he plays in. Therefore he is quite right in having all his senses satisfied -- be it sex, wine, food or clothes -- because the job, and he with it, may terminate at any minute. But the virtues that Amis mentions -- loyalty, honesty -- are there, too.”

Sean Connery (1930) Scottish actor and producer

PLAYBOY interview November 1965.

Food, Sex, Sense, Loyalty

“Most of the confidence which I appear to feel, especially when influenced by noon wine, is only a pretense.”

Tennessee Williams (1911–1983) American playwright

"I am widely regarded as the ghost of a writer," (1977), from New Selected Essays: Where I Live, ed. John S. Bak and John Lahr (New Directions Publishing, 2009)

Feeling, Confidence, Appearance

“In the evening you hear the scream of bats,
Two black horses jump in the meadow,
The red maple rustles.
To the traveller the small inn appears by the wayside.
Wonderful the taste of young wine and nuts,
Wonderful: stumbling drunk into darkening wood.
Through black branches painful bells sound,
On the face dew drips.”

Georg Trakl (1887–1914) austrian poet

"Towards Evening My Heart," Poems (1913)
Source: http://publicdomainreview.org/2014/10/29/wild-heart-turning-white-georg-trakl-and-cocaine/

Pain, Travel, Appearance, Horse

“Within the vermilion gate, meats and wines go to waste
While on the roadside lie the frozen bodies of the poor.”

Du Fu (712–770) Chinese poet of the Tang Dynasty

As quoted in Lin Yutang's The Vermilion Gate (1914)

Lie

“Port-wine, he says, when rich and sound,
Warms his old bones like nectar:
And as the inns, where it is found,
Are his especial hunting-ground,
We call him the INN-SPECTRE.”

Lewis Carroll (1832–1898) English writer, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer

Of "Inspector Kobold", a spectre
Canto 3, "Scarmoges"
Phantasmagoria (1869)

“As the Bajauris were rebels and at enmity with the people of Islam, and as, by reason of the heathenish and hostile customs prevailing in their midst, the very name of Islam was rooted out from their tribe, they were put to general massacre and their wives and children were made captive. At a guess more than 3000 men went to their death; as the fight did not reach to the eastern side of the fort, a few got away there. The fort taken, we entered and inspected it. On the walls, in houses, streets and alleys, the dead lay, in what numbers! Comers and goers to and fro were passing over the bodies… With mind easy about the important affairs of the Bajaur fort, we marched, on Tuesday the 9th of Muharram, one kuroh (2m) down the dale of Bajaur and ordered that a tower of heads should be set up on the rising ground. On Wednesday the 10th of Muharram, we rode out to visit the Bajaur fort. There was a wine-party in Khawaja Kalan's house, several goat-skins of wine having been brought.”

Babur (1483–1530) 1st Mughal Emperor

Babur-Nama, translated into English by A.S. Beveridge, New Delhi reprint, 1979, pp. 370-71.

Death, Men, Hostility, Children

“It was like discovering a complete wine-filled cellar filled with bottles of an amazing wine of a kind and flavor never tasted before. It quite intoxicated me….”

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (1892–1973) British philologist and author, creator of classic fantasy works

No. 163: On his discovery of Finnish language, in a letter to W. H. Auden (1955)
The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien (1981)

“The Spirit is like new wine, see the disciples all,
Like men inebriate, swept away and enthralled
By both its heat and strength; thus it remains true still
That the disciples had of sweetest wine their fill”

Angelus Silesius (1624–1677) German writer

The Cherubinic Wanderer

Men

“When I was a child the atmosphere in the house was one of puritan piety and austerity. There were family prayers at eight o'clock every morning. Although there were eight servants, food was always of Spartan simplicity, and even what there was, if it was at all nice, was considered too good for children. For instance, if there was apple tart and rice pudding, I was only allowed the rice pudding. Cold baths all the year round were insisted upon, and I had to practice the piano from seven-thirty to eight every morning although the fires were not yet lit. My grandmother never allowed herself to sit in an armchair until the evening. Alcohol and tobacco were viewed with disfavor although stern convention compelled them to serve a little wine to guests. Only virtue was prized, virtue at the expense of intellect, health, happiness, and every mundane good.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Source: 1950s, Portraits from Memory and Other Essays (1956), p. 9

Children, Health, Alcohol, Family

“We shall go at once
To the deep caverns of the rock
Which are all secret,
There we shall enter in
And taste of the new wine of the pomegranate. ~ 37”

John of the Cross (1542–1591) Spanish mystic and Roman Catholic saint

Spiritual Canticle of The Soul and The Bridegroom

Secret

“Fear had long since taken root
In every breast, and now these crushed its fruit,
The ripe hate, like a wine”

Robert Browning book Sordello

Book the First
Sordello (1840)
Context: But, gathering in its ancient market-place,
Talked group with restless group; and not a face
But wrath made livid, for among them were
Death's staunch purveyors, such as have in care
To feast him. Fear had long since taken root
In every breast, and now these crushed its fruit,
The ripe hate, like a wine: to note the way
It worked while each grew drunk! men grave and grey
Stood, with shut eyelids, rocking to and fro.
Letting the silent luxury trickle slow
About the hollows where a heart should be;
But the young gulped with a delirious glee
Some foretaste of their first debauch in blood
At the fierce news

Hate, Fear

“Does anyone bathe in a mighty little time? Don't say that he does it ill, but in a mighty little time. Does anyone drink a great quantity of wine? Don't say that he does ill, but that he drinks a great quantity. For, unless you perfectly understand the principle from which anyone acts, how should you know if he acts ill? Thus you will not run the hazard of assenting to any appearances but such as you fully comprehend.”

Epictetus (50–138) philosopher from Ancient Greece

45
The Enchiridion (c. 135)

Drink, Understanding, Appearance, Time

“We have dined well. The fish, the veal cutlets, the wine have blunted the sharp tooth of egotism. Anxiety is at rest.”

Virginia Woolf book The Waves

Bernard, section VIII
The Waves (1931)
Context: We have dined well. The fish, the veal cutlets, the wine have blunted the sharp tooth of egotism. Anxiety is at rest. The vainest of us, Louis perhaps, does not care what people think. Neville’s tortures are at rest. Let others prosper — that is what he thinks. Susan hears the breathing of all her children safe asleep. Sleep, sleep, she murmurs. Rhoda has rocked her ships to shore. Whether they have foundered, whether they have anchored, she cares no longer.

Fish

“Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I'll not look for wine.”

Ben Jonson To Celia

Song, To Celia, lines 1-16; this poem was inspired by "Letter XXIV" of Philostratus, which in translation reads: "Drink to me with your eyes alone…. And if you will, take the cup to your lips and fill it with kisses, and give it so to me".
The Works of Ben Jonson, First Folio (1616), The Forest
Context: Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I'll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove's nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.
I sent thee late a rosy wreath,
Not so much honoring thee
As giving it a hope that there
It could not withered be.
But thou thereon didst only breathe,
And sent'st it back to me;
Since when it grows and smells, I swear,
Not of itself, but thee.

Drink, Kiss

“My whole past life I live again in memory, and, involuntarily, I ask myself: 'why have I lived - for what purpose was I born?'… A purpose there must have been, and, surely, mine was an exalted destiny, because I feel that within my soul are powers immeasurable… But I was not able to discover that destiny, I allowed myself to be carried away by the allurements of passions, inane and ignoble. From their crucible I issued hard and cold as iron, but gone for ever was the glow of noble aspirations - the fairest flower of life. And, from that time forth, how often have I not played the part of an axe in the hands of fate! Like an implement of punishment, I have fallen upon the head of doomed victims, often without malice, always without pity… To none has my love brought happiness, because I have never sacrificed anything for the sake of those I have loved: for myself alone I have loved - for my own pleasure. I have only satisfied the strange craving of my heart, greedily draining their feelings, their tenderness, their joys, their sufferings - and I have never been able to sate myself. I am like one who, spent with hunger, falls asleep in exhaustion and sees before him sumptuous viands and sparkling wines; he devours with rapture the aerial gifts of the imagination, and his pains seem somewhat assuaged. Let him but awake: the vision vanishes - twofold hunger and despair remain!
And tomorrow, it may be, I shall die!… And there will not be left on earth one being who has understood me completely. Some will consider me worse, others, better, than I have been in reality… Some will say: 'he was a good fellow'; others: 'a villain.”

Mikhail Lermontov book A Hero of Our Time

And both epithets will be false. After all this, is life worth the trouble? And yet we live - out of curiosity! We expect something new... How absurd, and yet how vexatious!
A Hero of Our Time (1840; rev. 1841)

Love, Life, Hunger, Pain

“I beg you listen to this advice—
When you can get wine, be sure to drink it.”

Tao Yuanming (365–427) Chinese poet

Substance, Shadow, and Spirit, "Substance speaks to Shadow" (translation by A. Waley)
In A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1919), 'Poems By Tao Ch'ien', p. 106
Context: Heaven and Earth exist for ever:
Mountains and rivers never change.
But herbs and trees in perpetual rotation
Are renovated and withered by the dews and frosts:
And Man the wise, Man the divine—
Shall he alone escape this law?
Fortuitously appearing for a moment in the World
He suddenly departs, never to return.
How can he know that the friends he has left
Are missing him and thinking of him?
Only the things that he used remain;
They look upon them and their tears flow.
Me no magical arts can save,
Though you may hope for a wizard's aid.
I beg you listen to this advice—
When you can get wine, be sure to drink it.

Drink

“Read as you taste fruit or savor wine, or enjoy friendship, love or life. ”

George Herbert (1593–1633) Welsh-born English poet, orator and Anglican priest

Love, Life, Friendship, Reading

“But, gathering in its ancient market-place,
Talked group with restless group; and not a face
But wrath made livid, for among them were
Death's staunch purveyors, such as have in care
To feast him. Fear had long since taken root
In every breast, and now these crushed its fruit,
The ripe hate, like a wine: to note the way
It worked while each grew drunk! men grave and grey
Stood, with shut eyelids, rocking to and fro.
Letting the silent luxury trickle slow
About the hollows where a heart should be;
But the young gulped with a delirious glee
Some foretaste of their first debauch in blood
At the fierce news”

Robert Browning book Sordello

Book the First
Sordello (1840)

Hate, Heart, Way, Fear

“Whether at Naishapur or Babylon,
Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run,
The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop,
The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.”

Omar Khayyám (1048–1131) Persian poet, philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer

Source: The Rubaiyat (1120)

Life

“Wine will make you whine all the day long.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“Gratitude is the wine for the soul. Go on. Get drunk.”

Rumi (1207–1273) Iranian poet

https://twitter.com/wise_chimp/status/1488946174321205253?s=21

Soul, Gratitude

“Sometimes I take all the shine
Talk like I drank all the wine
Years ahead but way behind
I'm on one, two, three, four, five
No half-truths, just naked minds
Caught between space and time
This not what they had in mind
But maybe someday...”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Ghost Town
Lyrics, Ye (2018)

Time, Truth, Way

“Give me wine to wash me clean of the weather-stains of cares”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

Weather

“Is that what the wine is for? To help you think?"
"Oh, the wine. The wine, Costis, is to help hide the truth. It doesn't work. It never has, but I try it every once in a while just in case something in the nature of the wine might have changed.”

Megan Whalen Turner The King of Attolia

Source: The King of Attolia

Truth, Nature, Thinking, Change

“Nobody can be uncheered with a balloon.”

A.A. Milne book Winnie-the-Pooh

Source: Winnie-the-Pooh

Happy, Cute

“Avoiding me, Quen downed a swallow of wine. "Trent is a fine young man," he said, watching the remaining wine swirl.

"Yes… " I drawled, cautiously. "If you can call a drug lord and outlawed-medicine manufacturer a fine young man.”

Kim Harrison (1966) Pseudonym

Source: Ever After

“A writer needs four things to achieve greatness, Pasquale: desire, disappointment, and the sea.”
“That’s only three.”
Alvis finished his wine. “You have to do disappointment twice.”

Jess Walter book Beautiful Ruins

Source: Beautiful Ruins

Disappointment, Sea

“Beer dulls a memory, brand sets it burning, but wine is the best for a sore heart's yearning.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Name of the Wind

Source: The Name of the Wind

Beer, Memory, Heart

“The worst gift I was given is when I got out of rehab that Christmas; a bottle of wine. It was delicious.”

Craig Ferguson (1962) Scottish-born American television host, stand-up comedian, writer, actor, director, author, producer and voice a…

Christmas

“It is the useless things that make life worth living and that make life dangerous too: wine, love, art, beauty. Without them life is safe, but not worth bothering with.”

Stephen Fry book Moab Is My Washpot

Referencing Oscar Wilde from the preface of "The Picture of Dorian Gray"; "All art is quite useless".
1990s, Moab is My Washpot (autobiography, 1997)
Source: Moab Is My Washpot
Context: … but love, like all art, as Oscar said, it's quite useless. It is the useless things that make life worth living and that make life dangerous too: wine, love, art, beauty. Without them life is safe but not worth bothering with.

Love, Life, Beauty, Art

“It was like a bird of rarest-spun heaven metal or like silvery wine flowing in a spaceship, gravity all nonsense now.”

Anthony Burgess book A Clockwork Orange

Source: A Clockwork Orange

Bird

“Hi, this is Ganymede, cup-bearer to Zeus, and when I'm out buying wine for the Lord of the Skies, I always buckle up!”

Rick Riordan book The Sea of Monsters

Source: The Sea of Monsters

“While we are alive we should sit among colored lights and taste good wines, and discuss our adventures in far places; when we are dead, the opportunity is past.”

Jack Vance (1916–2013) American mystery and speculative fiction writer

Color, Light, Past, Dead

“I am not in favor of imposing happiness on people. Everyone has a right to his bad wine, to his stupidity, and to his dirty fingernails.”

Milan Kundera (1929–2023) Czech author of Czech and French literature

Source: Farewell Waltz

People, Stupidity, Happiness

“Wine can be a better teacher than ink, and banter is often better than books”

Stephen Fry (1957) English comedian, actor, writer, presenter, and activist

Source: The Fry Chronicles

Books, Teachers

“Because my spelling is Wobbly. It's good spelling but it Wobbles, and the letters get in the wrong places.”

A.A. Milne book Winnie-the-Pooh

Source: Winnie-the-Pooh (1926), Chapter Six - Pooh.

“Dandelion wine. The words were summer on the tongue. The wine was summer caught and stoppered… sealed away for opening on a January day with snow falling fast and the sun unseen for weeks…”

Ray Bradbury (1920–2012) American writer

Sun, Summer

“Age appears best in four things: old wood to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust and old authors to read.”

Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, and author

No. 97
Apophthegms (1624)
Context: Alonso of Aragon was wont to say in commendation of age, that age appears to be best in four things — old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read.

Age, Drink, Appearance, Reading