International Wine Quotes

The famous French gourmet Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin. Talk about a wine and food pairing expert.

Wine is truly a universal language. We thank unknown translators for rendering these pearls of wisdon into flawless, literary English. Translations of the Classical Persian poet, Omar Khayyam are by Fitzgerald.

Within the bottle’s depths, the wine’s soul sang one night.
Charles Baudelaire, French poet and critic, (1821-1867)

Wine, the most delightful of drinks, whether we owe it to Noah, who planted the wine, or to Bacchus, who pressed the juice from the grape, goes back to the childhood of the world.
Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, French gastronome, (1755-1826)

Your true amateur sips his wine; as he lingers over each separate mouthful, he obtains from each the sum total of pleasure which he would have experienced had he emptied his glass at a single draught.
Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, French gastronome, (1755-1826)

Burgundy makes you think off silly things, Bordeaux makes you talk of them and Champagne makes you do them. Think of silly things, Bordeaux makes you talk of them and Champagne makes you do them.
Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, French gastronome, (1755-1826)

A hard drinker, being at the table, was offered grapes for dessert. "Thank you," said he, pushing the dish away from him, "but I am not in the habit of taking my wine in pills."
Anthelme Brillat-Savarin,  "The Physiology of Taste" French gastronome, (1755-1826)

Wine, the most pleasant of drinks, whether we owe it to Noah who planted the vine, or whether it is due to Bacchus, who squeezed the juice out of the grape, dates from the infancy of the world.
Anthelme Brillat-Savarin,  French gastronome, (1755-1826)

A meal without wine is like a day without sunshine.
Anthelme Brillat-Savarin,  French gastronome, (1755-1826)

And that you may the less marvel at my words, Look at the sun's heat that becomes wine when combine with the juice that flows from the vine.
Dante Alighieri, Italian author, (1265-1321)

The discovery of a good wine is increasingly better for mankind than the discovery of a new star.
Leonardo da Vinci, Italian artist, (1452-1519)

Wine is the intellectual part of a meal, meats are merely the material part.
Alexandre Dumas sr, French novelist, (1802-1870)

Wine is sunlight, held together by water.
Galileo Galilei, Italian scientist and mathematician, (1564-1642)

It is said that dining one night at Potsdam with Wilhelm II, Bismarck was served German 'Champagne' or Sekt. He tasted it ... and put down his glass. The kaiser looked at him inquiringly. 'Your Majesty,' said Bismarck, 'I cannot drink German champagne.' Wilhelm explained that he had decided to serve Sekt rather than the Chancellor's beloved Heidsieck, not only for reasons of economy, but as a patriotic gesture. 'Your Majesty,' said Bismarck simply, 'I am extremely sorry. My patriotism stops short of my stomach.’
Johann Wolfgang Goethe, German poet and philosopher, (1749-1832)

Johann Wolfgang Goethe, a famous German poet, once was asked, which three things he would take to an island. He stated: "Poetry, a beautiful woman and enough bottles of the world's finest wines to survive this dry period!" Then he was asked what he would leave back first, if it was allowed to take only two things to the island. And he briefly replied: "The poetry!" Slightly surprised, the man asked the next question: "And Sir, what would you leave back if only one was allowed?" And Goethe thought for a couple of minutes and answered: "It depends on the vintage!"

The only friends who are free from cares are the goblet of wine and a book. Give me wine...that I may for a time forget the cares of the world.
Hafiz (Shams al-Din Mohammed), Persian Poet, (1380-1388)

God made only water, but man made wine.
Victor Hugo, French author and politician, (1802-1885) in Les Contemplations

Upon the first goblet he read this inscription, monkey wine; upon the second, lion wine; upon the third, sheep wine; upon the fourth, swine wine. These four inscriptions expressed the four descending degrees of drunkenness: the first, that which enlivens; the second, that which irritates; the third, that which stupefies; finally the last, that which brutalizes.
Victor Hugo, French author and politician, (1802-1885) in Les Misérables

How simple and frugal a thing is happiness: a glass of wine, a roast chestnut, a wretched little brazier, the sound of the sea. . . . All that is required to feel that here and now is happiness is a simple, frugal heart.
Nikos Kazantzakis, Greek author (1883-1957), in Zorba the Greek

Better be jocund with the fruitful Grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter fruit.
Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, (1048-1122)

The Grape that can with Logic absolute
The Two-and-Seventy jarring Sects confute:
The sovereign Alchemist that in a trice
Life's leaden metal into Gold transmute.
Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, (1048-1122)

Assist, almighty wine, for thou alone hast power,
Assist while with just praise I thee adore.
Thou art the world's great soul, that heavenly fire,
Which dost our half-kinded mass inspire.
A friend and a bottle is all my design;
He has no room for treason that's top-full of wine. and
I often wonder what the vintners buy
One half so precious as the stuff they sell.
Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, (1048-1122)

I wonder what the vintners buy one half so precious as the stuff they sell.
Omar Khayyam, Persian Poet, (1048-1122)

Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse - and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness -
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.
Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, (1048-1122)

Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust into Dust, and under Dust, to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and - sans End!
Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, (1048-1122)

A full cup of wine at the right time is worth more than all the kingdoms of this earth!
Gustav Mahler, Bohemian-Austrian composer, (1860-1911) in Das Lied Von Der Erde

I feast on wine and bread, and feasts they are.
Michelangelo, Italian painter and sculptor, (1475-1564)

Diogenes was asked what wine he liked best, and he answered as I would have done when he said, "Somebody else's."
Montaigne, French essayist, (1533-1592)

Wine is inspiring and adds greatly to the joy of living.
Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor, (1769-1821)

Nothing makes the future look so rosy as to contemplate it through a glass of Chambertin.
Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor, (1769-1821)

In victory, you deserve champagne, in defeat, you need it..
Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor, (1769-1821) also attributed to Winston Churchill

I drink champagne when I win, to celebrate . . . and I drink champagne when I lose, to console myself.
Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor, (1769-1821)

Clearly, the pleasures wines afford are transitory - but so are those of the ballet, or of a musical performance. Wine is inspiring and adds greatly to the joy of living.
Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor, (1769-1821)

Never did a great man hate good wine.
Francois Rabelais, French humorist, (c. 1493-1553)

I do not drink more than a sponge.
Francois Rabelais, French humorist, (c. 1493-1553)

Some of the most dreadful mischiefs that afflict mankind proceed from wine; it is the cause of disease, quarrels, sedition, idleness, aversion to labor, and every species of domestic disorder.
François de Salignac de la Mothe Fénelon, French bishop and author, (1651-1715)

…stories about [the German composer Johannes] Brahms's rudeness and wit amused me in particular. For instance, I loved the one about how a great wine connoisseur invited the composer to dinner. 'This is the Brahms of my cellar,' he said to his guests, producing a dust-covered bottle and pouring some into the master's glass. Brahms looked first at the color of the wine, then sniffed its bouquet, finally took a sip, and put the glass down without saying a word. 'Don't you like it?' asked the host. 'Hmm,' Brahms muttered.
'Better bring your Beethoven!'.
Arthur Rubinstein, Polish pianist, (1886-1982) in My Young Years

When the wine goes in strange things come out.
Friedrich Schiller, German dramatist, (1759-1805)

(Wine is) the divine juice of September.
Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet), French writer, 1694-1778

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