No. 21: Who is making all this coffee?
July 9, 2015 11:48 AM   Subscribe

What I Assume Honoré de Balzac Thought After Drinking Each of His 50 Daily Cups of Coffee (SLNewYorker)

The master of French Realism details his strenuous morning routine as he gets ready to write "the good sentences." By Clickhole writer Brendan O'Hare.

See also: Clickhole quiz Are You Addicted to Coffee?
posted by joechip (48 comments total) 20 users marked this as a favorite
 
No. 22: My stomach sounds like the angriest sea in the entire world.
posted by graymouser at 12:00 PM on July 9, 2015 [4 favorites]


Wasn't this a Futurama episode?🚀
posted by sexyrobot at 12:02 PM on July 9, 2015 [4 favorites]


Can that possibly be true about Balzac? Can you drink 50 cups of coffee a day without dying or having some other horrible effects?
posted by Sangermaine at 12:07 PM on July 9, 2015


Decaf would probably be fine, so I suppose it depends on what you call "coffee".
posted by LogicalDash at 12:08 PM on July 9, 2015


I don't know about the health effects, but it seems to have made him inclined to some really awful puns. For instance, he once referred to a critic's negative review as "A Kick in the Balzac."
posted by ZenMasterThis at 12:11 PM on July 9, 2015 [4 favorites]


Can that possibly be true about Balzac?

Maybe? (but probably not)
posted by uncleozzy at 12:11 PM on July 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


This reminds me of the story of Wade Boggs drinking 64 beers on a cross-country flight.
posted by dudemanlives at 12:14 PM on July 9, 2015 [3 favorites]


"writing stories and tales"
I laughed aloud.
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 12:18 PM on July 9, 2015


FRESH POTS!!!
posted by en forme de poire at 12:22 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


Ugh this guys a genius (the clickhole author I mean, Balzac is a maniac and I think you know why)
posted by Potomac Avenue at 12:25 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


No. 35: There is no way my heart does not give out soon. I will die at fifty-one, because of the horrible liquefied coffee bean.

I am issuing my "Sentence Of The Day" award early, because I don't think I'll encounter one that tops this.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 12:29 PM on July 9, 2015 [3 favorites]


That clickhole quiz is really a thing of beauty: 'If I go even one hour without getting my sludge on I become belligerent, and I say cruel and unforgivable things such as, “I like it when helpful people get carsick.”' Omfg.
posted by en forme de poire at 12:30 PM on July 9, 2015 [3 favorites]


Can that possibly be true about Balzac? Can you drink 50 cups of coffee a day without dying or having some other horrible effects?

I'm guessing these were small cups of weak coffee.
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:30 PM on July 9, 2015


I'm guessing these were small cups of weak coffee.

According to uncleozzy's link above, they were small (demitasse size) but as strong as he could make it, and he would drink 2 or 3 of them at a time. If each demitasse had 2-3 fluid ounces, he may have drank between 100 and 150 ounces of coffee a day. Which is still a lot, but not as fantastically a lot as "50 cups" might make you think.
posted by graymouser at 12:37 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


Or not! In the man's own words:

"I have discovered a horrible, rather brutal method that I recommend only to men of excessive vigor, men with thick black hair and skin covered with liver spots, men with big square hands and legs shaped like bowling pins. It is a question of using finely pulverized, dense coffee, cold and anhydrous, consumed on an empty stomach. This coffee falls into your stomach, a sack whose velvety interior is lined with tapestries of suckers and papillae. The coffee finds nothing else in the sack, and so it attacks these delicate and voluptuous linings; it acts like a food and demands digestive juices; it wrings and twists the stomach for these juices, appealing as a pythoness appeals to her god; it brutalizes these beautiful stomach linings as a wagon master abuses ponies; the plexus becomes inflamed; sparks shoot all the way up to the brain. From that moment on, everything becomes agitated. Ideas quick-march into motion like battalions of a grand army to its legendary fighting ground, and the battle rages. Memories charge in, bright flags on high; the cavalry of metaphor deploys with a magnificent gallop; the artillery of logic rushes up with clattering wagons and cartridges; on imagination's orders, sharpshooters sight and fire; forms and shapes and characters rear up; the paper is spread with ink - for the nightly labor begins and ends with torrents of this black water, as a battle opens and concludes with black powder."
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:38 PM on July 9, 2015 [45 favorites]


No. 15: The bean’s juice gives me my power, and allows me to write the good sentences.

No. 25: I am halfway through my fifty cups—unfortunately it is around this time that I begin to tire slightly of the taste. Oh well! I need to push through, if I want to write the good words.

This sounds like the Brendan O'Hare's own thought process while writing this list, not Honoré de Balzac's.
posted by Rangi at 12:43 PM on July 9, 2015


I can't read the Balzac article because it's behind a paywall, but I can at least contribute the fact that the great Oscar Levant was known for his coffee consumption, throwing back on the order of 40-50 cups a day. He pretty much made his living from being a high-strung, neurotic, dyspeptic fidgeter, so it was basically a career move. Can Balzac say the same?
posted by Dr. Wu at 12:46 PM on July 9, 2015


Whenever I see a dog on the street, I hold a coffee mug underneath its mouth for a little bit just in case it’s the kind of dog that squirts hot jets of coffee out of its mouth.

I... Wow. Coffee addiction might be the least of your issues if you do this.
posted by Rangi at 12:49 PM on July 9, 2015 [3 favorites]


The bean’s juice gives me my power, and allows me to write the good sentences.

It is by the juice of sapho that thoughts acquire speed, the lips acquire stains, the stains become a warning.
posted by The Tensor at 12:50 PM on July 9, 2015 [4 favorites]


50 cups of coffee a day is what I imagine the vilest depths of hell to require.
posted by poffin boffin at 12:54 PM on July 9, 2015


I figured there would be more thoughts about peeing.
posted by jonmc at 12:57 PM on July 9, 2015 [7 favorites]


he may have drank between 100 and 150 ounces of coffee a day

Which is about the same as the largest Starbucks cup, right? So no biggie.
posted by aught at 12:58 PM on July 9, 2015 [3 favorites]


So no biggie.

No no, the largest Starbucks cup is a 'venti', not a 'biggie'.
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:02 PM on July 9, 2015 [7 favorites]


No no, the largest Starbucks cup is a 'venti', not a 'biggie'.

Alas.
posted by Celsius1414 at 1:05 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


Balzac ate Comice pears by the dozens and was capable of eating 100 oysters as a starter, so yeah, I'm inclined to believe his coffee stats.

He was also a coffee snob. I highly, highly recommend Anka Muhlstein's book to those interested in literature and gluttony.
posted by peripathetic at 1:07 PM on July 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


Sadly, the article is behind a paywall for me, too, as I've apparently used up my allotment of free NYer stories. So it goes...

Related excessive-coffee-consumption trivia: I seem to recall reading that the late comic actor/writer/director Marty Feldman drank 40-50 cups of strong coffee a day, and this level of consumption was likely a factor in his early death (he had a massive heart attack at age 48 after being stricken with food poisoning).
posted by mosk at 1:15 PM on July 9, 2015


No. 50 I need to pee. I need to poop. I need to pee. I need to poop.
posted by ChuckRamone at 1:18 PM on July 9, 2015 [3 favorites]


The episodes of Futurama where Fry drinks 100 cups of coffee, and Always Sunny in Philadephia where the gang tries to recreate the Wade Boggs flight from Philly-LA are both two of the series' best.
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:27 PM on July 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


Voltaire was supposed to have drank 50-72 cups a day, and he lived a lot longer than Balzac.
posted by Schmucko at 1:51 PM on July 9, 2015


I don't often find an excuse to tell this one, so here goes:

An elderly couple was on vacation at a nudist resort. The husband had come only reluctantly and only after repeated beseechings by his wife, who felt they had gotten complacent and wanted to do something new and different. He thought the idea was rather silly, and just wanted to go somewhere quiet to rest and read.

At the resort he hesitantly ventured forth from their room with a newspaper and some magazines and headed straight for some wicker chairs that had been placed in the shade of some palm trees, his plan being to block out the other goings-on and pass the time undisturbed. However, he found the chair so uncomfortable that he was unable to concentrate on reading. Throwing his paper down with annoyance, he noticed another older gentleman sitting in a nearby chair reading a book of poetry by Victor Hugo. "Ah," he thought, "here's someone I can have a decent conversation with."

Leaning toward the other man, he spoke up, "Excuse me - have you read Balzac?"

Squirming fitfully, the other man replied, "Yes, it's these damned wicker chairs!"
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:55 PM on July 9, 2015 [16 favorites]


dudemanlives: This reminds me of the story of Wade Boggs drinking 64 beers on a cross-country flight.

May he rest in peace.
posted by emelenjr at 1:57 PM on July 9, 2015


100 and 150 ounces of coffee a day

That seems much more reasonable. I drink 8-10 cups of 8-10oz caffeinated coffee a day (so something like 64-100 oz). Doubling that would probably not be wise (and cutting it probably _would_ be wise), but I doubt it would kill me quickly.
posted by thefoxgod at 2:01 PM on July 9, 2015


Balzac's own writing on coffee, which is excerpted above, is totally amazing.
posted by persona au gratin at 2:08 PM on July 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


This thought certainly sounds familiar though: No. 33: I am making a conscious choice to harm myself by overindulging in coffee.
posted by thefoxgod at 2:12 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


Related excessive-coffee-consumption trivia: I seem to recall reading that the late comic actor/writer/director Marty Feldman drank 40-50 cups of strong coffee a day, and this level of consumption was likely a factor in his early death (he had a massive heart attack at age 48 after being stricken with food poisoning).

He also had Graves' Disease, which is a thyroid condition that can lead to heart complications. That was the cause of his famous bulging eyes.
posted by atoxyl at 3:19 PM on July 9, 2015


But I guess he had a reputation for numerous unhealthy habits on top of that.
posted by atoxyl at 3:20 PM on July 9, 2015


Balzac ate Comice pears by the dozens and was capable of eating 100 oysters as a starter, so yeah, I'm inclined to believe his coffee stats.

He also had a special white monastic robe, with hood, that he wore when writing which I thought was silly until I realized that I don't think of myself as 'writing for work' unless I have on a tie.

(He also had a famously long romance by post that completely crashed and burned when, you know, that actually met in person.)
posted by The Whelk at 3:51 PM on July 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


He also had a famously long romance by post that completely crashed and burned when, you know, that actually met in person.

I thought they fell in love and got married, at which point he promptly died...
posted by mr_roboto at 5:21 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


Ah yes I mixed it up with someone else, but he did drop dead five months later
posted by The Whelk at 5:48 PM on July 9, 2015 [1 favorite]


'Droll Stories' was banned in Ireland for obscenity in 1953.
posted by clavdivs at 6:34 PM on July 9, 2015


He pretty much made his living from being a high-strung, neurotic, dyspeptic fidgeter

God DAMN my high school guidance counselor
posted by George_Spiggott at 7:53 PM on July 9, 2015 [2 favorites]


He pretty much made his living from being a high-strung, neurotic, dyspeptic fidgeter

Omg wait, is this still a viable career path because I am FOUR FOR FOUR BABY
posted by en forme de poire at 8:51 PM on July 9, 2015


No. 51 my face... It vibrates?
posted by Hairy Lobster at 2:34 AM on July 10, 2015


Squirming fitfully, the other man replied, "Yes, it's these damned wicker chairs!"

I originally encountered this joke as “Have you read Marx?”
posted by acb at 5:24 AM on July 10, 2015 [4 favorites]


for months in high school, i thought my french teacher was totally putting us on by saying Balzac

If this was pronounced "ball-zac", well, that's not how you say it in French. The first bit rhymes with "Al", like "Al Bundy".

Sure, I used to be a French teacher, why do you ask?
posted by Wolof at 7:47 AM on July 10, 2015


“When I read a book, I always read Balzac
When I take a drug, I always take Prozac”
– the band that played at Kevin Mitnick's out-of-jail party
posted by acb at 9:52 AM on July 10, 2015


Whoa. I did not know about Brendan O'Hare. Now I do. Thank you. He's a really really funny writer.
posted by ManInSuit at 8:05 PM on July 10, 2015 [1 favorite]


So I was thinking about it, can 100 ounces of coffee be an SI unit called 1 Balzac?
posted by graymouser at 5:38 PM on July 11, 2015


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