For a site called Marrying Words and Wine, I have done very little of the talking about wine part. I have wrestled with myself on how exactly to approach the subject, as I have perhaps too many ideas rattling around my skull. Do I simply ramble about Cold-Climate grapes and wines, and juxtapose them with Old World or West Coast wine? Do I post my own poetry or writings that feature wine as subject matter? Do I explore other author’s relationship with wine and analyze their works? I am not the first person to enjoy wine and also write – there are a multitude of poets who have transcribed their feelings on this noble beverage. I think, while I want to do it all, for the first wine-related post, I’ll keep it simple with an introductory piece focused on author’s who have a known connection with wine in one way or another.

To begin the discussion of the interplay of wine and writing, let us first explore and evaluate their work instead of mine. For they and their words have been immortalized, while I and mine have assuredly not.

Authors Who Wrote of Wine

• Ernest Hemingway
• Oscar Wilde
• William Shakespeare
• John Milton
• W.B. Yeats
• Virginia Woolf
• Sylvia Plath
• F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Edgar Allan Poe
• Robert Louis Stevenson
• The list goes on!

We probably all know the stories about Hemingway writing while drunk, and he often featured wine within his novels too. No one can forget all the references to drinking in Shakespeare’s plays, or Stevenson’s quote “Wine is bottled poetry.” Poe wrote from his complex relationship with wine, and Plath loved a drink but didn’t write much about it. Fitzgerald used his favorite, Champagne, as a literary symbol! Woolf compared wine to language and writing itself, while Milton both praised and beseeched it in equal measure. Oscar Wilde had many a fond opinion of the drink, as did several other non-authors of note, including Galileo Galilei and even Socrates. But I think the man who encapsulated the love of wine most astutely and concisely was W.B. Yeats with his poem titled “A Drinking Song”

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.

Regardless of personal opinion on wine, there has always been plenty to say about it, and it plays an important role in writing – whether as a means of inspiration, fuel, or metaphor – that cannot be denied!
Who did I miss in my list? What is your favorite wine quote or poem? Share in the comments!