The reason I usually drive to Austin is to get drunk,
and this trip was no exception.Though whiskey is
my drink of choice,I planned on getting shitfaced on
absinthe,the notorious "Green Fairy".Once the famed bane
of Bohemian lushes such as Arthur Rimbaud,Oscar Wilde,
and Vincent Van Gogh,the legendary liquor has been
banned in the United States for nearly 90 years.As I drove
south on I-35,passing up Carl's Corner and the little Czech
bakery in West,I mulled over the imminent possibilities
that absinthe might afford:I could kill someone,or
degenerate into a slobbering mess of a human being,or slap down
some sketch that would make my grandchildren a million
bucks after I died.I was looking to get gone.
My hookup,Norman,lives in a tin-roofed house south
of the Colorado River,and he moonshines absinthe in his
kitchen.When he opened the door,Norman looked every
inch the found-object artist that he is,with close-cropped
hair and a goatee,wearing a V-neck undershirt and Birkenstock
sandals.He ushered me into the kitchen as I explained
the purpose of my visit.I said I was writing a story
about absinthe and had obtained some of this bootlegger's
"juice" from one of his associates.
But what really piqued my interest was that I had heard
nary a word of the stuff two years ago when I visited Spain
and Portugal,the only countries,along with the Czech Republic
and Great Britain,where it is legal.I had hoped I
could find some closer to home,and I did.In the home of
a card-carrying artist-type who operates an illegal distillery.
Sweating in his non-air-conditioned kitchen,Norman
prepared me a glass of absinthe.I watched closely as he
began the process by dumping two tablespoons of sugar
into the bottom of a clear,stemmed glass.The pale-green
absinthe came next.He then added cold water,and a wonderful,
opaque suspension was formed.He stirred the mixture,
added ice cubes,and poured some into a glass for
himself.Roughly a fourth of the bottle was left,and he
indicated he was saving it for a special occasion.
The first drink of the emerald concoction I had ever had,
during an earlier,half-assed foray into the world of absinthe,
dove into my body like a bird of prey on fire.Anise coated
my tongue before turning into a rust-flavored dirt at the
back of my throat,and then preceeded to singe my esophagus
down to my stomach,where it soothingly warmed once
it came to a rest.I had wanted to drink the Green Fairy
for a long time.The idea had been bandied about on several
occasions by like-minded college friends,but nobody
knew much about it,and we certainly didn't know how to
get it.Then,about a year ago,I read an article about it's
resurgent popularity,rekindling my interest.I recalled the
famous,creative fuckups who downed it with abandon for
"inspiration";people butchered there wives while caught up
in the waves of absinthe binges;the French had to ban it to
show up for World War I.I wanted some of the mojo.
With Norman,I waited,wincing at the thought of another
shot of the opaline liquid,for the tingle or the shudder or
the tracer that would herald the arrival of the Green Fairy.
My anticipation swelled.She was coming for me,and my
bags were packed and sitting by the door.This would be it.
Absinthe was nothing new during it's heyday in
the late 1800s.Wormwood (Artemisia absinthium),it's
essential ingredient,had been around for some time,
garnering several mentions in the Bible and a nod of
prise from Roman historian Pliny the Elder in the
first century A.D.Medicinally,it reportedly remedied
everything from bronchial inflammation to stomach
illnesses to tapeworms to bad breath;a branch
hung from a rafter supposedly held off the
plague during the Middle Ages.
Modern,distilled absinthe first
surfaced in western Switzerland in
the middle of the 18th century.
Two sisters were popular for
their brew,and in 1797 their
recipe was bought by one
Henri Dubied,a French major.
Dubied's daughter was
married to Henry-Louis
Pernod,and the two men
began brewing what would
eventually become the most
popular brand in the world,
Pernod Fils.
But popularity breeds
abuse,and as early as 1857
addicts of the green drink were
observed and "treated" in French
sanitariums.The growing anti-
absinthe climate came to a head in
1905 when Jean Lanfray,a Swiss vineyard
worker,downed two glasses of it on
the day he returned home from laboring and
resumed a tiff with his wife that had begun that
morning.He ended the argument by shooting her in the
face,unknowingly killing her 4-month-old fetus also.
Lanfray's two daughters,at 4 and 2 years old,met similar
fates before he turned the rifle on himself.The Swiss
temperance movement seized on the incident,specifically the
involvement of absinthe (though Lanfray had consumed
large amounts of other alcohol that day as well),and
coupled it with another absinthe-related murder in Geneva a
few days later.Finally,public outcry gained enough
momentum to ban the liquor in Switzerland in 1908;the law
went into effect two years later.
By the time the opening salvos of World War I were fired,
many countries such as the United States had followed suit,
and absinthe became the first and last spirit ever to be
banned by name.Only in England,Spain and France was
it still legal.And only in France did it enjoy an astounding
level of popularity:The French version of happy hour became
known as l'heure verte,the "green hour".
But the French soldiers of World Wars I weren't the only
people engaged in combat.France itself launched into social
battle over the status of absinthe in it's culture.Doctors,
though far from united,were convinced that absinthe
-principally it's wormwood constituent- was responsible
for everything from mental illness to epileptic seizures to
tuberculosis to France's declining birth rate at the time.
Politicians pushed these notions into public debate,particulary
because absinthe had evolved from the relatively obscure
(and expensive) drink of the upper classes and affluent
Bohemians in the mid-1800's to the common man's
drink-of-choice by the turn of the century.Not surprisingly,
surtaxes on the sale of absinthe constituted nearly
1% of France's annual budget,and the National
Assembly wasn't eager to abolish that revenue.
Though the French governing bodies turned the other
cheek,the military didn't.In 1900,the Ministry of War
banned the sale of distilled spirits in military installations,
followed closely by temperance sections in military units.
As the shot heard 'round the world echoed off the pavement
in Sarajevo to usher in World War I,the French
commandant of Morocco prohibited absinthe there.Other
French generals followed suit.
Germany declared war on France on August 3,1914,and
the French Chamber of Deputies voted for a total ban eight
months later.Ironically,the French army,which originally
issued medical absinthe (to combat fevers,et cetera) for the
Algerian War in the 1840's,had made the Green Fairy popular
among the general public in the first place.The military
had ushered in the era of absinthe and ultimately
disposed of it with relative ease.A French newspaper
trumpeted the victory,claiming that the French people had
been "saved from the fatal brink of lunacy and degeneracy".
Nothing was happening.The so-called absinthe
lunacy stayed dormant as I lounged on Norman's
L-shaped couch,glancing repeatedly at the two huge hand
prints defining the found-object piece above his mantel.
The 38-year-old artist asked about the gallery scene in
Dallas;I told him what I knew,which wasn't much.
Another question about the local scene;I anticipated
going mental.Alas,nothing.Just like my first time.
History assured me that no one is left unscathed by the
stuff.It would take hold of me in it's own sweet time.
I had looked around for absinthe for several months
before meeting Norman.An aquaintance said she could score
some from a "friend" in Austin.She produced a very small
glass decanter of the most horrible-looking,horrible-smelling,
home-brewed swill encountered by man.I call it The
Brown Fairy.It was the only absinthe I'd ever seen,and it wouldn't
have looked amiss in a toilet bowl.Regardless,it was absinthe,or
so I thought,and I decided to give it a go.
Judging that a bucolic setting would be more interesting than
a living-room couch,I headed for the park on Lake Ray Hubbard.
Arriving about half past six in the evening,I set up shop on a
picnic table under some cottonwood trees near the shore.Sitting
on the bank of a lake is a far cry from a bustling Parisian cafe.
Both are al fresco,but one lacks a gaggle of drunk,chatting,
yelling,and laughing Frenchmen.
Back in the day,an order of absinthe included a tall piece of
stemware with a fairly narrow mouth,a perforated spoon,lumps
of sugar,a carafe of chilled water,and a measure of absinthe.My
implements consisted of a remarkable 6-ounce drinking glass,
a strainer,a box of ice cubes,and some lukewarm water in plastic
bottles,plus a meager stash.So much for historical accuracy.
A substantial component of the mystery and nostalgia that
surrounds absinthe lies in the preparation ritual.Like intravenous
drugs,all of the gear has a specific purpose:Once the absinthe is
poured into the glass (ideally about two inches worth),the spoon
is placed across the mouth supporting a cube of sugar.
Water is then slowly poured over the sugar,causing it to dissolve
into the absinthe.The sugar counteracts the bitterness of the drink,
and when the water was added,it forms a solution.The clear,green
hue of the absinthe assumes a lighter,milky green opalescence.
I prepared the absinthe as close to the ritual as the tools
allowed.Luckily,the sugar dissolved,the brown liquid turned taupe
with water,and isolated green spots floated on top like oil.There
was enough for about two glasses.
After the first sip,I slowly experienced a calming effect,both
mentally and physically.Care and stress seemed to fade into a
background that had no real shape or form.Colors became more
lush and pronounced,noises became louder and clearer.I was
reflective,and found myself fixated on a certain plant for no
ascertainable reason:Every time I looked away,it pulled me back.
I didn't feel any trace of paranoia.The neuroses that so often
accompany altering substances simply weren't there.The high
alcohol content of the absinthe - traditionally around 140 proof,
though I had no idea what this particular brew contained - killed
any worries.The other psychological effects,though,were similar
to the effects of tetrahydrocannabinol,or THC,the psychoactive
ingredient in marijuana.
Chemically,the primary essence of wormwood oil in absinthe
is known as thujone.Historically,it has been associated with the
isomers camphor and menthol and labeled a convulsant poison.
However,American researchers in 1975 published findings that
observed that thujone and THC,both terpenoids,have a similar
molecular structure that ostensibly allow for closely related metabolic
reactions occuring from the introduction into the body.
More recent research doubts the likelihood of that
explanation.Thujone itself may be psychoactive;when injected into
rats,it produces a painkilling response similar to codeine,and
it's possible that it bonds with different receptors in the brain
than THC does.Other explanations for the psychoactive effect
of absinthe lie in it's other ingredients:nutmeg,hyssop,
calamus,and fennel,or the numerous combinations produced
by chemical compounds in the mix itself.No one knows for
certain.But one thing is:There's a massive amount of booze in the
Green Muse,and alcohol is a very reliable painkiller.
The slight physiological aspects of the drink I first
experienced were along the numbing/painkiller lines.I began pinching
myself,hard.I struck pain after about the forth pinch on my
outer forearm.Apparently,my tolerance hadn't been raised that
much.The skin on my arm felt distant,like someone else's arm.
So I was numb.Big deal.Where was the wellspring of desire to
render an object from all sides,like Picasso's famous cubist
technique?Rimbaud,wasted on absinthe,had sliced Paul Verlaine's
wrists over a congenial drink one afternoon.I certainly wasn't
violent,but neither did I have a mad passion to create suddenly.
I wasn't seeing Van Gogh's Starry Night.
It didn't matter,though.I was perfectly content to sit slack-jawed
and stare.If anything,I felt like a character in Edgar Dega's 1876
painting L'Absinthe,peering at the world through melancholy eyes.
But this just wasn't it.This wasn't the absinthe I was looking
for.I wanted the green machine,the stuff that makes people go
crazy.I needed it.And I was willing to drive 220 miles to get it.
Degas caused quite a row in the London art world in
1893,with L'Absinthe,which depicted a docile man and woman
at a table in a cafe staring blankly over a glass of absinthe.The
English had already developed a dim view of life across the
Channel,and they found the painting vulgar.But the work is
indicative of fin de siecle Bohemian life in Paris,a time when
poets,artists,musicians,prostitutes,and many others haunted
the sun-dappled boulevards,gathered in cafes to share ideas,
consumed anything they could get their hands on - from hashish to
ether - and drank liver-stifling amounts of the Green Muse.
The creative sorts who flocked to Paris in the mid-1800's
cottoned to absinthe quickly,and it didn't take long for it's effects
to show up in their work.Edouard Manet submitted a work titled
The Absinthe Drinker to the Salon of Paris in 1859.It was
rejected,not only because the powers-that-were looked upon
absinthe as an unwelcome addition to the genteel,wine-centric life
of the cafes,but also due to it's subject matter:Manet depicted a
bum with a top hat,posed not in humility or shame,but with a
defiant,almost regal air about him.It represented a challenge to
the sensibilities of the time;the morality of the painting was
ambiguous,if present at all,and therefore dangerous.
Other artists and writers also rejected the religious and social
mores of the past and were quick to experiment with absinthe's
pleasures.Charles Baudelaire sought nobility in common,everyday
life and searched for moral liberation through the use of copious
amounts of mind-altering substances.Paul Verlaine turned
on practically everyone he came in contact with to the Green Fairy,
most notably a young Rimbaud.
Oscar Wilde crossed paths with a depressed,soused Verlaine in
1883 in Paris,during the height of Wilde's popularity.But Wilde
was jailed in 1895,and upon release two years later,fled to France
where he began drifting and drinking until his death in 1900.His
description of absinthe is arguably most compelling:"After
the first glass you see things as you wish they were.After the
second,you see things as they are not.Finally you see things as they
really are,and that is the most horrible thing in the world."
Fin de siecle painters undoubtedly saw things as they really were,
or as they appeared to them through an absinthe haze anyway.Taking
a cue from Manet,they rejected classicism,turned to subjects
from still-lifes to landscapes to cafe scenes,and all had at least a
few works dedicated to absinthe.Most were heavy users.You can
see it in the work - bright,shimmering colors,blurred lines,and a
sense of movement,even in images ostensibly static.Picasso
painted absinthe drinkers in droves,and used absinthe
paraphernalia in a number of his cubist works.Henri
de Toulouse-Lautrec,Paul Gauguin,Alfred Jarry,
Adolphe Monticelli - all were steeped in
this ethic,and their works drip of absinthe.
Vincent Van Gogh was already a
certified head case when he encountered
absinthe,and the drink didn't do him any
favors.Too immobilized by Paris' readily
available excesses,he moved to
Arles in Provence.There,he painted the
late-night scene Night Cafe at Arles,
populated by drunks and layabouts,
that,despite the bright colors,comes
off as a morose and seedy haunt - a
reflection of Van Gogh's precarious
mental state and absinthe abuse.He killed
himself after being commited for trying
to drink turpentine in his studio.
Suicide crossed my mind,but not for
any hallucinogenic reasons.There I was,sitting in
an inferno of a living room in Austin,the one glass of
real absinthe I would have for God knows how long dwindling
away to nothing.The Green Muse had fueled one of the most
glorious-but-brief creative eras of the modern age and had numbed
the lips of my favorite artists,but all it was giving me was a horrible
case of licorice-flavored burps.I didn't feel drunk in the slightest.I
wasn't experiencing any polar shift in perception.I hadn't seen a single
wood nymph.This was not the liquid madness I expected.I was
pouring sweat and talking to Norman,for crying out loud.
I told him about the stuff I had tried earlier."Oh,you had some
bad absinthe,"he said.I felt vindicated.Norman had actually
brewed the sample I tried.He said it was his first attempt,and he
was fully aware of how awful it was.
Norman first became intrigued with absinthe about four
years ago after having it at a party.He had found the recipe on
the Internet,where information is readily available.Absinthe
has found a dubious new existence on the Web,right next to
pipe bombs,off-shore casinos,and strip shows.All of the
ingredients are available in local stores.
"I'm pretty sure it was just anise and wormwood,"he said
of the components of this latest batch,which followed an old
Pernod recipe.He had brewed four times to his recollection,
the last two the most successful."The stuff you had before
was alot harsher,"he said,laughing.
The Brown Fairy had been an experiment."I just soaked
the herbs in alcohol,which is one way you can make it.But
this stuff is distilled,"he said,indicating his glass.According
to him,after distillation,the thujone comes out,and the
stuff is actually palatable,but the color is lacking.He then
added more wormwood to the distilled product,which lended
the mix both the emerald tint and much of the bitterness.
Norman discribed his rig,which sounded like a stove-top
version of something MacGyver and Uncle Jesse from The
Dukes of Hazzard might have whipped up if they were drinking
buddies with a poetic bent.All I will say is that it involved
a pressure cooker,a metal tube,and a pan.The process requires
about two weeks to be performed correctly,and costs approximately
$60 for the required equipment and ingredients.But
keep this in mind:It is illegal to distill your own spirits in Texas.
Wine and beer are okay,but when you're talking about cooking
absinthe,you're moonshining.Penalties for bootlegging range
from a $100 to $1,000 fine and up to a year in jail.
Norman doesn't know if he will cook up another batch.
"It was pretty much a hassle to make in the first place,"he
said."It was just an experiment,playing around.Maybe
next year,maybe for Christmas."If he does,he says he'll
stick to improving on his simple mixture,and might try
herbal additives to heighten the flavor.
We talked about the effects,sipping all the while,the soft
afternoon light streaming through his windows.He said he
had never had any earth-shattering visions either,even after
drinking quite a bit,but had a friend he trusted who had seen
things after trying some at one of Norman's parties.
"I've always been interested in weird experiences,"he said,
then suggested I try something out.At his urging,I placed
my hands into two handprint-shaped recesses
on the wall-sized work of Norman-
art that dominated the living
room wall.Wired with 12
volts of electricity,it
surprised more than
shocked me.Between
the heat of the room,
the alcohol,and his
relaxed demeanor,
I was lulled.Or
calmed.Or maybe
a little bit
absinthed.Perhaps
simply annoyed.
Finishing the
glass,and secretly
longing for
alot more,I took
my leave.There
had been no
visions,no muse,no
madness.Just a
battery-powered shock.I
was more than a little
disappointed.
And though I didn't get to see
anything,I believe I found the Green
Fairy.For me,she lives in a glass consumed on a warm
summer afternoon,talking about art,and watching life roll by.
But from now on,I'm sticking to whiskey.*
~from The Met issue #25 6/23-30/99
