Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

It’s fine to drink wine on St. Patrick’s day.
James Joyce did *
And not just on St. Patrick’s †

* He doted on the white Fendant wine from the Valais region of Switzerland.

†  [Joyce] was a stupendous drinker and included among his companions Ernest Hemingway, Samuel Beckett (who served as his secretary for a brief time), Ezra Pound and many other expatriate writers residing in Paris during the 1920s. Joyce drank mostly white wine and compared his favorite Swiss white wine to urine, an archduchess’s to be sure. He hardly drank spirits. He loathed red wine because to him it tasted of blood. Recounting his many drinking bouts with Joyce, Hemingway once remarked: “He was a nice man, but nasty, especially if anyone started talking about his writing. He was proud and very rude — especially to jerks.”