What is Absinthe?
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A bitter liquor with the alcoholic content somewhere around 80% which is
made of a mixture of wormwood, angelica root, fennel, coriander, hyssop,
marjoram, and flavored with anise.
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Wormwood� was the most important element of absinthe.��
Normally, a beneficial substance alone, when mixed with alcohol� and
the other herbs,� wormwood would produce hallucinations and sudden
(often violent) outbursts.
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Anise, the other vital element of absinthe which� was used to flavor
the liquor has often been considered an aphrodisiac.
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How was it Prepared?
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The absinthe was poured over a lump of sugar in a slotted spoon into a
glass of ice.� Then cold water was dripped over the sugar until it
all dissolved into the liquid.� Thus, giving absinthe its bittersweet
taste.
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Where did it come From?
������� The healing properties of wormwood were known and applied by the ancient Greeks.� This knowledge was harmlessly passed through the ages until French soldiers encountered the drink absinthe during the conquest of Algiers (1830-1847).� During the war, the drink was used to cure many ailments including fever and dysentery and also to purify the water.� Wormwood had also long been used as an insecticide.� However, when the French brought absinthe home with them,� the medicinal purposes where shadowed by the hallucinatory and delirious effects of the drink.
������� Absinthe then made its way across Europe and to New Orleans.
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However, due to its addictive nature and harmful side effects true absinthe
was banned in the United States in 1912 and banned in most other European
countries.� However, it is still legal in Spain.
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Who drank Absinthe?
������� The two most notorious absinthe drinkers were the poets Paul Verlaine (1844-1896) and� Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1890).� Although, Verlaine had been an avid fan of the liquor prior to meeting Rimbaud, it wasn't until after the two became close that his addiction became uncontrollable.� Together with their debauchery and imbibery, these two became infamous absintheurs.
������� Rimbaud's poetry reveals the crazed state their minds were in during these days.
������������������������������������������� Ordinary Nocturne
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One breath tears operatic rents in these partitions,
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Destroys the pivots of eroded roofs,
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Dispels the limits of the hearth,
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Make casements disappear.
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Along the vine I came,
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Using a gargoyle as a footrest,
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And into this carriage which shows its age
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In convex windowpanes, in rounded panels,
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In torturous upholstery.
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Hearse of my lonely sleep,
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Shepard's cart of my stupidity...
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The vehicle spins on the grass of an overgrown highway;
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In a blemish high on the right window
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Revovle pale lunar fictions, breasts and leaves.
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A very dark green and a very dark blue blot out the image.
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We unhitch and unharness beside a patch of gravel.
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-Here we will whistle for storms, for Sodoms and Solymans,
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For wild beasts and armies.
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(Postilion and dream horses will ride on
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through more dense and suffocating groves,
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to sink me to my eyelids in the silken spring.)
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-And drive ourselves off, whipped through splashing water
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And spilled drinks, to roll oon the barking of bulldogs...
����������������������������������� One breath dispels the limits of the hearth.
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- ARTHUR RIMBAUD
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