Today is International Beer Day! To commemorate the world’s love of pilsner, lager, stout, and more, we picked these quotes about beer from some of our favorite authors we wish we could to share a pint with. Read on for examples of how beer serves as inspiration and plays into classic works of literature.
“’Three beers,’ said Big Lawrence and he slapped two quarters onto the bar.
‘You boys ain’t old enough to drink beer,’ said the bartender.
‘Okay,’ said Lawrence, ‘give us two Cokes, and give him a beer — he’s old enough.’” —Terry Southern, Texas Summer
“When Eugene’s paintings are selling, he drinks Mexican beer. When they aren’t, it’s Genesee. Everyone knows this, and, insofar as you can kid Eugene, we kid him about it. Now Beth and I get our choice of Tecate or Sol.” —Francine Prose, The Peaceable Kingdom
“I lit a cigarette and began puffing on it as I drank one quick beer after another. I was neither a drinker nor a smoker nor a fighter, but I had planned to be all three on this day.” —Pat Conroy, The Lords of Discipline
“‘I’ll tell you a joke,’ said Long John Salmon, erupting out of his silence.
‘Good,’ said Brogan, as he sipped from his whiskey glass and his stout glass alternately. It was the only way to drink enjoyably.” —Edna O’Brien, The Love Object
“Far above him a few white clouds were racing windily after a pale gibbous moon. Drink all morning, they said to him, drink all day. This is life!”―Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano
“Okay, I’m flattered, I appreciate your attempt at making me feel better after the fiasco with the pita rolls, but please ring up this beer … I need it more than flattery.” —Amanda Filipacchi, Love Creeps
“I like to eat crawfish and drink beer. That’s despair?” —Walker Percy
“‘Let’s drink something cool and refreshing,’ Phlox said, bobbing her head, widening then narrowing her eyes like some lustful and wily biblical queen.
‘Beer,’ said Arthur and I.” —Michael Chabon, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh
“Feldman, who had not often drunk beer even before his illness, suddenly felt a desire to have some. ‘I’ll have some Pabst Blue Ribbon.’” —Stanley Elkin, Criers & Kibitzers, Kibitzers & Criers
“‘From now on I’m going to brew all my own drinks, thanks to toby. Here. Look at this,’ He indicated a grubby bottle full of some fiery-looking liquid. ‘It’s home-made beer’ he said, ‘and jolly good too. I made three, but the other two exploded. I’m going to call it Plaza beer.’ ” —Lawrence Durrell, Balthazar
“Seldom in modern fiction have so many people remained drunk for so long as in ‘The Gay Place.’” —The New York Times Book Review, 1961 (Billy Lee Brammer)
“Michael was thinking of beer. He walked deliberately behind Ackerman, in the dusty heat, thinking of beer in glasses, beer in schooners, beer in bottles, kegs, pewter mugs, tin cans, crystal goblets. He thought of ale, porter, stout, then returned to thinking of beer. He thought of the places he had drunk beer in his time. The round bar on Sixth Avenue where the Regular Army Colonels in mufti used to stop off on the way uptown from Governor’s Island, where they served beer in glasses that tapered down to narrow points at the bottom and where the bartender always iced the glass before drawing the foaming stuff out of the polished spigots. The fancy restaurant in Hollywood with prints of the French Impressionists behind the bar, where they served it in frosted mugs and charged seventy-five cents a bottle. His own living room, late at night, reading the next morning’s paper in the quiet pool of light from the lamp, as he stretched, in slippers, in the soft corduroy chair before going to bed. At baseball games at the Polo Grounds in the warm, hazy summer afternoons, where they poured the beer into paper cups so that “you couldn’t throw the bottles at the umpires.” —Irwin Shaw, The Young Lions
We hope these authors inspired you to find the time today to share in the festivities. Whether you are among friends in your favorite bar, or at home with a good brew and book, there really is no wrong way to celebrate International Beer Day—as long as you do it responsibly. Happy drinking!