Port and literature

Anything to do with Port.
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Alex Bridgeman
Graham’s 1948
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Re: Port and literature

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

djewesbury wrote:... I'd have murdered the lot of them, starting with Harriet.
Rather a harsh critique on poor Harriet Walters' efforts in the 1987 TV adaptation. Personally I thought she was rather good and played off Edward Petherbridge's foppish twit better than most would have been able to.
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
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djewesbury
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Re: Port and literature

Post by djewesbury »

AHB wrote:
djewesbury wrote:... I'd have murdered the lot of them, starting with Harriet.
Rather a harsh critique on poor Harriet Walters' efforts in the 1987 TV adaptation. Personally I thought she was rather good and played off Edward Petherbridge's foppish twit better than most would have been able to.
Ian Carmichael was better. On the wireless.Those TV adaptations look horribly dated now.
Daniel J.
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Alex Bridgeman
Graham’s 1948
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Re: Port and literature

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

djewesbury wrote:
AHB wrote:
djewesbury wrote:... I'd have murdered the lot of them, starting with Harriet.
Rather a harsh critique on poor Harriet Walters' efforts in the 1987 TV adaptation. Personally I thought she was rather good and played off Edward Petherbridge's foppish twit better than most would have been able to.
Ian Carmichael was better. On the wireless.Those TV adaptations look horribly dated now.
I agree with the view that wireless is more timeless than TV. Which leads me to wonder whether Paul Temple ever indulged in decent Port. I do recall he and Steve fumbling around in a lightless cellar in one story and discovering by touch some Champagne, which they opened and which he recognised by taste and smell.

I'll need to listen to the stories again to see whether Port is mentioned.
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
LGTrotter
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Re: Port and literature

Post by LGTrotter »

AHB wrote:
djewesbury wrote:... I'd have murdered the lot of them, starting with Harriet.
Rather a harsh critique on poor Harriet Walters' efforts in the 1987 TV adaptation. Personally I thought she was rather good and played off Edward Petherbridge's foppish twit better than most would have been able to.
I am with Daniel on this one, assuming he means Harriet Vane, rather than Walters. I think one of the main problems with "Busman's Honeymoon" was that it was written as a stage play and then converted into a novel. If Daniel means Harriet Walters then I am with Alex. Either way Ian Carmichael is the man for me.
PhilW
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Re: Port and literature

Post by PhilW »

Having just watched the film "Remains of the day", I noted the butler removed a bottle of Dow 1913 from the cellar. Fortunately I was able to check in "Port Vintages" to confirm that no such vintage appears to exist. Does anyone know whether the bottle is mentioned in the original book?
PopulusTremula
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Re: Port and literature

Post by PopulusTremula »

In Our Game by Le Carré:

I remember thinking, as the thousand-voiced choir of angels struck up inside my head, that if you're celebrating your emergence from the black light, a bottle of '55 Cheval Blanc and a large dose of Graham's '27 port make an appropriately celestial accompaniment.

Great author, wonderful command of English. And the yarns aren't half bad either.
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Alex Bridgeman
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Re: Port and literature

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

Dorothy Sayers again (she clearly liked her Port). In the Lord Peter Wimsey story The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club he is interrupted by Murbles while drinking Cockburn 1886 and they share several glasses together.

Daniel did make a passing reference to this fact but didn’t include it in this thread.
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
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Alex Bridgeman
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Re: Port and literature

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

Another reference from Dorothy Sayers. In her first book featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, Whose Body, Lord Peter’s valet, Bunter, is required to obtain some information from the manservant of the chief suspect. He does this by raiding Lord Peter’s Port cellar and drinks a bottle of “the old Port”, which he later identifies as Cockburn 1868. The book also clearly puts the events in the year 1920, so being roughly the same as drinking Fonseca 1966 or Noval 1967 today.
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
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jdaw1
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Re: Port and literature

Post by jdaw1 »

AHB wrote: 23:28 Fri 20 Dec 2019Another reference from Dorothy Sayers. In her first book featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, Whose Body, Lord Peter’s valet, Bunter, is required to obtain some information from the manservant of the chief suspect. He does this by raiding Lord Peter’s Port cellar and drinks a bottle of “the old Port”, which he later identifies as Cockburn 1868. The book also clearly puts the events in the year 1920, so being roughly the same as drinking Fonseca 1966 or Noval 1967 today.
No: ’66 is a superior vintage to ’68.
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Alex Bridgeman
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Re: Port and literature

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

In Nevil Shute’s “On the Beach” the hero of the story visits the Pastoral Club, “the best private member’s club in the Commonwealth” - mostly because it is the only private members club remaining in the Commonwealth in the post-nuclear apocalypse setting.

His host complains that “there are still over 3,000 bottles of Vintage Port to drink and only 6 months to go” to drink them. “Some of the Fonseca is a year or two too young to be ideal but the Gould Campbell is in its prime!” It was the fault of the Wine Committee, who should have seen the apocalypse coming.

“The only thing to do is to make the best of it!”
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
MigSU
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Re: Port and literature

Post by MigSU »

That's a good book, Alex.
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Alex Bridgeman
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Re: Port and literature

Post by Alex Bridgeman »

It’s one I’ve not read for about 40 years and had completely forgotten the Port reference.
Top Ports in 2023: Taylor 1896 Colheita, b. 2021. A perfect Port.

2024: Niepoort 1900 Colheita, b.1971. A near perfect Port.
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JacobH
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Re: Port and literature

Post by JacobH »

Alex Bridgeman wrote: 11:17 Tue 05 Oct 2021 In Nevil Shute’s “On the Beach” the hero of the story visits the Pastoral Club, “the best private member’s club in the Commonwealth” - mostly because it is the only private members club remaining in the Commonwealth in the post-nuclear apocalypse setting.

His host complains that “there are still over 3,000 bottles of Vintage Port to drink and only 6 months to go” to drink them. “Some of the Fonseca is a year or two too young to be ideal but the Gould Campbell is in its prime!” It was the fault of the Wine Committee, who should have seen the apocalypse coming.

“The only thing to do is to make the best of it!”
It’s not a novel I’ve read but I notice the setting is 1957 which of course raises the inevitable* question: which vintages is he referring to? Would the Fonseca 1945 really have been approaching maturity by 1959? If not, I think we have to dive back to the 1934. But I think that must have been drinking well by 1957. So perhaps the club has a special bottling or he meant a Fonseca Guimaraens?

For the Gould Campbell, perhaps it would have been a vintage from the 20s? The 1927 would probably have been “in its prime” in 1957.

[* And, no doubt, pointless because this was a throwaway comment.]
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winesecretary
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Re: Port and literature

Post by winesecretary »

Nevil Shute was a great craftsman and was recognised as such by, amongst others, Dorothy Parker.
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