{"id":27987,"date":"2025-06-01T01:00:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-31T13:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/?p=27987"},"modified":"2025-06-24T11:50:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-23T23:50:09","slug":"the-session-147-roundup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2025\/06\/01\/the-session-147-roundup\/","title":{"rendered":"Beer and pubs in art and fiction \u2014 a roundup of The Session<\/i> #147"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A<\/a>
Detail from ‘Beer Street’ by William Hogarth<\/a> \u2014 with a fitting cameo there on the right<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Session<\/em><\/a> is a long-running and recently-rebooted series in which bloggers (and posters of other kinds) collectively contemplate a given prompt and respond however it moves them. For the May 2025 edition, I invited folks to think about the beer and pubs in art and fiction (broadly defined) that captured their attention, and to say a few words about why. And so now it’s my pleasure to share the many different (if interestingly overlapping) places people’s minds went from there.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>Basically in the order I read them, myself:<\/em><\/p>\n

Dave Waugh, a regular from my Wellington bartending days, spotted my post on Mastodon<\/a> and sent me the incredible Gin Lane<\/em> by William Hogarth, a pictorial polemic made to contrast with Beer Street<\/em>, from which I’ve taken the banner image here.<\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span> The pair is, as they say, a rich text<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A commenter on the original announcement post, Bill, was reminded of the repeated appearances of Old Peculier in the novels of Martha Grimes<\/a> \u2014 and his subsequent difficulty in finding it (or recreating it), inspired as he was. As it happens, there’s one last bottle on the orphan shelf<\/a> at the store where I now work.<\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span> I’ll have it for him.<\/p>\n

Liam (IrishBeerHistory<\/a>) felt the weight of the rich local tradition and dug out a gorgeous description of a “crapulent den”<\/a> of “sporadic mercy” with “weary proletarians at rest on arse and elbow” in some early Samuel Beckett.<\/p>\n

Sean Inman (Beer Search Party<\/a>), speaking of which, was on his way to Ireland and recommended Love<\/em> by Roddy Doyle<\/a>, as a novel in which a succession of realistically-rendered pubs form the backdrop. I’m sure he found a few to visit in person.<\/p>\n

Ding (of the eponymous blog<\/a>, and last month’s host) was instantly put in mind of a scene from the 1958 film Ice Cold In Alex<\/em><\/a>, and amused (maybe bemused) to discover an old Pete Brown post about the same<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Eduard<\/a>
Eduard von Gr\u00fctzner, ‘Bierprobe’ (1881)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Franz Hofer (Tempest In A Tankard<\/a>) celebrated the “merry monks” of German painter Eduard von Gr\u00fctzner<\/a>. The pieces he references are all<\/em> worth looking up, and I had to borrow the second one from his post. Just look that at that beer. I showed it to Emma and her review was simply “now that<\/em> was made with love.”<\/p>\n

Alan McLeod (A Good Beer Blog<\/a>), who at least partially inspired my choice of this month’s theme, looked back over previous posts of poetry<\/a>, lamented the loss of Beer Haiku Daily<\/em><\/a>, and finishes with some Keats; the turning of seasons and the ceaseless cycle of repetition and change clearly on his mind.<\/p>\n

Jordan Buck (@tripleclutcher<\/a> on Instagram) shared some fondly-remembered Achewood<\/em> comics<\/a> and marvelled at the brain filling in the gaps in low-detail but evocative artwork, and how the changing place of beer in your life recontextualises things on a second look.<\/p>\n

Phil (no relation, from Oh Good Ale<\/a>) knew he wanted to write about “beer in folk” but then hit a definitional problem familiar to anyone who has pondered “craft beer” \u2014 and solved the problem by tackling it from seventeen different angles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jess & Ray (a.k.a. Boak & Bailey<\/a>) note that, in addition to showing how in- or out-of-touch its creator is, a really<\/em> good fictional pub can help describe history<\/a>, and maybe even go on to shape<\/em> it…<\/p>\n

John Duffy (The Beer Nut<\/a>) takes us back to Irish literature and recommends a suitable way in to Ulysses<\/em> by way of a tangential scene in a real pub<\/a>, and transitions seamlessly into beer notes from a spot nearby.<\/p>\n

Joey Leskin (Beer In The City<\/a>) thinks back to the role The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy<\/em> played in his life<\/a> \u2014 both in seeking out drinking experiences and<\/em> wanting, in turn, to be a guide \u2014 and shares a recipe for a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster.<\/p>\n

Andreas Krennmair (Daft Eejit Brewing<\/a>) also<\/em> immediately thought of “six pints of bitter, and quickly please; the world’s about to end” from\u00a0Hitchhiker’s<\/em> and then went deep into the specific beers present in various adaptations of the story<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Laura Hadland (The Extreme Housewife<\/a>) runs through several excellent examples, more or less off the top of her head<\/a>: from the centrality of pubs to the ‘Cornetto Triology’ (despite its nickname), to The Two Brewers’ trivia night in The Detectorists<\/em> (which I really must finally watch).<\/p>\n

For my own piece, I recommended a relatively obscure incarnation of The Muppets<\/em><\/a> \u2014 which I loved partially for the bar run by Rowlf the Dog \u2014 and contrasted two quick beer references in\u00a0Deadloch<\/em> and The Umbrella Academy<\/em>; one of which sparkles while the other falls flat.<\/p>\n

[Edited to add, a few weeks later:] And finally, giving deadlines their due respect (i.e.<\/em>, very little) Kieran Haslett-Moore (Raise the Dawn<\/a>) offered a few observations on real ale pub culture in the Inspector Morse stories<\/a>, and some thoughts on how fiction can be as much a reflection of reality as a respite from it.<\/p>\n

Massive thanks to everyone who contributed; it’s a great collection of observations. Fittingly enough, given it was the last part of the last piece that I made a note for, Laura Hadland will be hosting the June edition and is asking for submissions on or around the theme of the pub quiz<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Session is a long-running and recently-rebooted series in which bloggers (and posters of other kinds) collectively contemplate a given prompt and respond however it moves them. For the May 2025 edition, I invited folks to think about the beer and pubs in art and fiction (broadly defined) that captured their attention, and to say … Continue reading Beer and pubs in art and fiction \u2014 a roundup of The Session<\/i> #147<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[35,77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-meta","category-session"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":906,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/10\/10\/beer-101-tasting-session\/","url_meta":{"origin":27987,"position":0},"title":"Beer 101 Tasting Session","author":"Phil","date":"October 10, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"George (the gifter of the original Diary) organised a little tasting session at his house for a few friends of ours, with me playing the Informative Nerd. 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