Poets and preachers alike were earnestly advised to seek
inspiration in a bottle or glass. This is one of the historic songs on the classic album The Tale of Ale:
Ye poets who pray on the Hellican brooke
The nectar of Gods and the juice of the vine,
You say none can write well except they invoke
The friendly assistance of one of the Nine.
His liquor surpassed the streams of Parnassus
That nectar, Ambrosia, on which Gods regale
Experience will show it, naught makes a good poet
Like quantum sufficients of Nottingham Ale.
You bishops and curates,
priests, deacons and vicars
When once you have tasted, you all must agree
That Nottingham Ale is the best of all liquors
And none understands a good creature like thee.
It dispels every vapor, saves pen, ink and paper
For when you`ve a mind in your pulpit to rail
It`ll open your throats, you may preach without notes
When inspired with a bumper of Nottingham Ale.
When once you have tasted, you all must agree
That Nottingham Ale is the best of all liquors
And none understands a good creature like thee.
It dispels every vapor, saves pen, ink and paper
For when you`ve a mind in your pulpit to rail
It`ll open your throats, you may preach without notes
When inspired with a bumper of Nottingham Ale.
There is an element of hyperbole in the song but it prompted
me to think about the affect of particular drinks on the mind and temperament.
A single glass to help speed creative thought seems modest
enough, but keeping it single is the challenge. The point is reached where
ideas become wackier, characters’ motivations become less consistent, and
dialogue becomes flatter. The balance between the inner voice of characters or
of a storyteller, and the weird thoughts we always have fizzing around our
heads somewhere (else we wouldn’t be attempting to create anything at all),
becomes more elusive. It’s that old dichotomy between control and fantasy.
If the inspiration flies a little fleeter as a glass goes
down, this begs one question. Is this solitary drinking?
The conclusion I have come to is that the first drink is
not. The second and third may well be. As long as the characters are still there with the writer, clearly audible, then no. But once they go, then it’s another matter.
The heavy brownness
of bitter, usually bottled when drunk at home, is quite quick at drowning them
out. And yet in company, at the pub, it opens up the questions that lead to
good exploratory conversations. Beer is an unselfish drink, perhaps? It's significant, I think, that the key quality of
a good bitter is balance – the malty and hoppy and indeed the fruity, all in
balance.
Whereas – keeping to traditional English drinks for now –
cider provides that jolt of physical energy that makes it an ideal labourer’s
tipple. The other day I did quite a lot of wooding – sawing and splitting logs
– and cider seemed to help me get through it. And yet there is an affect on
articulacy. Not a writer’s drink.
Wine or spirits are perhaps the best drink to help the words
flow. As Churchill said: ‘A
single glass of champagne imparts a feeling of exhilaration. The nerves are
braced, the imagination is agreeably stirred; the wits become more nimble. A
bottle produces the contrary effect. Excess causes a comatose insensibility. So
it is with war: and the quality of both is best discovered by sipping.’
There are Champagnes amongst beers. These are perhaps the
perfect drinks. Bodger’s barley wine. Lodz porter, a Polish beer very hard to
find even in Poland, let alone here, and probably one I will have to write
about separately...
A craft Champagne maker I met a few years back. |
Lodz Porter from Poland |