Bard-acious musings on fermented grape juice

Apparently Bill Shakespeare liked his fermented grape juice. He certainly paid tribute to it semi-regularly in his works:

“I drink to the general joy of the whole table” — “Macbeth”

“I am falser than vows made in wine.” — “As You Like It”

“Give me a bowl of wine. I have not that alacrity of spirit nor cheer of mind that I was wont to have.” — “Richard III”

“Give me a bowl of wine, In this I bury all unkindness.” — “Julius Caesar”

“If I had a thousand sons, the first humane principle I would teach them should be, to forswear thin potations and to addict themselves to [wine].” — Falstaff (left) in “Henry IV”

“O nectar, a poetry profound,
a liquid fair and hedonistic,
a drink meant truly not for mortals
but the gods of misty yore.
Burdened not by filtering or fining
or such slings and arrows beset by fools.
Get thee to a bottle.”
— This actually was written by the Wine Spectator’s Tom Fish, channeling Shakespeare