Can drinking and reading go together?

[VLM]

Is it possible that if you drink a bit heavily that you concentrate more on what you are reading or would you loose any focus and struggle reading anything, much the same as with drinking and driving?

[Kitt]

I would think like with anything there is a tipping point where you have gone too far.

[Caz Pedroso]

I would imagine you could probably enjoy one or two drinks and relax with a good book. but any more and if your anything like me, you would be tipsy and giggly and in no state to remember what you've read, if you could concentrate enough to read at all.

[Never Surrender]

id assume that you would lose focus after extreme amounts of alcohol, same with any task... whether that is just not taking in what you have been reading or whether that is vomiting over the pages is the question. 

[Sasha Distan]

one cider = happier writing

one and one half ciders = more focus

two ciders = no focus, fewer words, more typos.

 

like Kitt said, tipping points are everything. You gotta know your own personal limits.

[JamesSavik]

 

I can't say that it helps.

[Mann Ramblings]

I can sip on wine or brandy as literary lubricant, but it doesn't work if the buzz comes on. Then it's just a sloppy mess. (Me and the writing.)

[W_L]

Depends on the person

 

Hemingway was an alcoholic and he wrote some of his best work under the influence (Although, I do wonder if his editor ghost wrote some of his work)

 

Some of the best ideas are invented while buzzed, (I am not counting facebook in this category though)  

 

 

I do believe that there is a functional alcohol consumption limit, but it is arbitrary based on the individual.

[Irritable1]

Drinking and reading go together a tiny bit for me, but not nearly as well as eating and reading do. I can hardly sit down to a meal without a book in hand. 

[Bill W]

I was going to say, everything in moderation, but as WL pointed out, some of the greatest authors have also been heavy drinkers.  I'm not saying they were drinking or drunk when they wrote, but maybe it had to do with perspective.  Also, some of their stories may have originated from the alcohol produce hallucinations.  lol 

[Never Surrender]

reading the above posts - i know many people that drink and write. In fact, one of my lecturers actually recommends having a bit to drink before starting a difficult essay because it 'loosens the tongue' and 'makes the words flow' when you aren't over thinking it (and this works - my two best and most highly marked essays last year were ones that i started to write whilst under the influence) . So writing is a yes, reading is a no, at least for me

[zaf89]

A few glasses of wine will make me feel the emotions of the story more sharply sometimes, so that if it's a sad or angsty story, I feel the sadness of it deeper, and vice versa with happy/joyful stories. If that makes sense. Then again, I tend to be a sappy/maudlin drunk.

 

But, no, if I was taking shots of bourbon and trying to read, it probably wouldn't work out .

Edited August 13, 2014 by zaf89

[VLM]

Hhmm I get it and it's true... I wanted to start wil a story of my own for years now but couldn't get it out on paper (or Microsoft Word in that fact) and my brother told me to just drink and write... It worked, all those years of planning the story in my head just blurted out to the tips of my fingers.

 

When I finally couldn't focus after I swept the bottle of red wine, I left it at that point, now I can't seem to get the story going again.

 

I think after a had bought a new bottle and start drinking it again, I might be able to continue with the story...

 

Funny to say that I typed 1300 words before loosing concentration

[Thorn Wilde]

I can write drunk (though I have to check my work for typos the next day, and it's slow going sometimes), but I can't focus on reading. I tend to end up reading the same half page 15 times and then give up.

[SolarMaxx]

I can write drunk (though I have to check my work for typos the next day, and it's slow going sometimes), but I can't focus on reading. I tend to end up reading the same half page 15 times and then give up.

Hahaha -- what a wonderful thought! I'll have to run some trials and get back to you. I might have a shot of writing under the influence -- but reading?