"In the end, Balzac resorted to eating dry coffee grounds to achieve the desired effect. He died at age 49."
"For awhile," he wrote, "for a week or two at most, you can obtain the right amount of stimulation with one, then two cups of coffee brewed from beans that have been crushed with gradually increasing force and infused with hot water. For another week, by decreasing the amount of water used, by pulverizing the coffee even more finely, and by infusing the grounds with cold water, you can continue to obtain the same cerebral power."
He's not talking here about how great the stuff tastes. And although he used coffee to aid in his writing -- by stimulating his imagination and by keeping him awake and hunched over his parchment through the night -- he had no illusions that there were no drawbacks to his favorite drug: "Many people claim that coffee inspires them, but, as everybody knows, coffee only makes boring people even more boring."
It's not all bad though. The article goes on to say -
"At the same time, coffee and tea -- so-called "temperance beverages" -- managed to replace alcohol in many people's diets, markedly increasing productivity.
If coffee was the fuel of the Industrial Revolution, it's even more central to the information economy. It is, says Weinberg, "the cult drug of the computer world." Drunk in moderation, it provides "specific cognitive benefits that allow people to perform computer work better. It aids in visual spatial coordination, hand-eye coordination, and it helps improve your reasoning power."
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I want to remember to read this book sometime.
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress : A Novel
"Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress" - From School Library Journal -
"This beautifully presented novella tracks the lives of two teens, childhood friends who have been sent to a small Chinese village for "re-education" during Mao's Cultural Revolution. Sons of doctors and dentists, their days are now spent muscling buckets of excrement up the mountainside and mining coal. But the boys-Luo and the unnamed narrator-receive a bit of a reprieve when the villagers discover their talents as storytellers; they are sent on monthly treks to town, tasked with watching a movie and relating it in detail on their return. It is here that they encounter the little seamstress of the title, whom Luo falls for instantly. When, through a series of comic and clever tricks and favors, the boys acquire a suitcase full of forbidden Western literature, Luo decides to "re-educate" the ignorant girl whom he hopes will become his intellectual match. That a bit of Balzac can have an aphrodisiac effect is a happy bonus. Ultimately, the book is a simple, lovely telling of a classic boy-meets-girl scenario with a folktale's smart, surprising bite at the finish. The story movingly captures Maoism's attempts to imprison one's mind and heart (with the threat of the same for one's body), the shock of the sudden cultural shift for "bourgeois" Chinese, and the sheer delight that books can offer a downtrodden spirit. Though these moments are fewer after the love story is introduced, teens will enjoy them at least as much as the comic and romantic strands."
Emily Lloyd, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
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