An Exaltation of Soups (4 page)

“A rat’s droppings can spoil a whole cauldron of soup.” (C
HINA
)

“The chicken in the coop has grain, but the soup pot is near; the wild crane has none, but its world is vast.” (C
HINA
)

“The disobedient chicken obeys in a pot of soup.” (B
ENIN
)

“It is only the bones that rattle in the pot.” (L
EBANON
)

“If a man makes soup of his tears, ask him not for broth.” (A
FRICA
)

“Between the hand and mouth, the soup is lost.” (I
TALY
)

“The broth is cooking, and now we have to act as one.” (B
EDOUIN
)

“When it rains soup, the poor man has no spoon.” (S
WEDEN
)

“Better no spoon than no soup.” (G
ERMANY
)

“Boil stones in butter and the broth will be good.” (S
COTLAND
)

“In your neighbor’s soup, there is always one fatty morsel.” (I
RAN
)

“From all the fish in the pot, you can only make one soup.” (M
ADAGASCAR
)

“One who has been burned by the soup begins to blow on the yogurt.” (S
AUDI
A
RABIA
)

“Having learned his lesson with hot soup, he blows cold fish salad.” (J
APAN
)

“Who has been scalded with hot soup blows on cold water.” (R
USSIA
)

“He who burnt himself with soup blows also in the sour milk.” (R
OMANIA
)

Well, dinner would have been splendid if the wine had been as cold as the soup, the beef as rare as the service, the brandy as old as the fish, and the maid as willing as the Duchess.

—W
INSTON
C
HURCHILL
,
twentieth-century British statesman

It looks like a tortoiseshell cat having a fit in a bowl of tomato soup.

—M
ARK
T
WAIN
,
nineteenth-century American humorist,
about a J. M. W. Turner landscape painting

Sex is like eating a meal. Sometimes you just want a bowl of soup, and other times you want the three-course meal.

—E
LIZABETH
H
USS
,
contemporary American sex therapist

Marriage is the meal where soup is better than the dessert.

—A
USTIN
O’M
ALLEY
,
early-twentieth-century
American medical writer

Memories are like mulligatawny soup in a cheap restaurant. It’s best not to stir them.

—P. G. W
ODEHOUSE
,
twentieth-century English humorist

Whenever I sit with a bowl of soup before me, listening to the murmur that penetrates like the distant song of an insect, lost in contemplation of the flavors to come, I feel as if I were being drawn into a trance.

—J
UNICHIRO
T
ANIZAKI
,
twentieth-century Japanese novelist
,
In Praise of Shadows

I’m now painting with all the élan of a Marseillais eating soup, which won’t surprise you when I tell you I’m painting large sunflowers.

—V
INCENT VAN
G
OGH
,
nineteenth-century Dutch artist,
writing to his brother Theo in 1888

Do you have a kinder, more adaptable friend in the food world than soup? Who soothes you when you are ill? Who refuses to leave you when you are impoverished and stretches its resources to give you a hearty sustenance and cheer? Who warms you in the winter and cools you in the summer? Yet who also is capable of doing honor to your richest table and impressing your most demanding guests?… Soup does its loyal best, no matter what undignified conditions are imposed upon it. You don’t catch steak hanging around when you’re poor and sick, do you?

—M
ISS
M
ANNERS
(J
UDITH
M
ARTIN
),
contemporary American
etiquette columnist

What I love about cooking is that after a hard day, there is something comforting about the fact that if you melt butter and add flour and then hot stock
, it will get thick!
It’s a sure thing! It’s a sure thing in a world where nothing is sure; it has a mathematical certainty in a world where those of us who long for some kind of certainty are forced to settle for crossword puzzles.

—N
ORA
E
PHRON
,
contemporary American food writer

An army travels on its stomach. Soup makes the soldier.

—N
APOLEON
B
ONAPARTE
,
nineteenth-century
French emperor

When we were growing up, we were so poor that our heritage was the only thing we had. Mama would say, “Kids, pour more water in the soup. Better days are coming.”

—A
SHLEY
J
UDD
,
contemporary American actress

When I see a shipwreck, I like to know what caused the disaster … [I learned] nothing but the glow that wrapped her face when the soup came. That’s the story.

—O. H
ENRY
(W
ILLIAM
S
YDNEY
P
ORTER
),
nineteenth-century American short story writer,
about bringing a homeless woman home to dinner

Of Soups: no good housewife has any pretensions to rational economy who boils animal food without converting the broth into some sort of soup.

—M
ARGARET
H
UNTINGDON
H
OOKER
,
The Gentlewoman’s Housewifery,
1896

It is usual to commence with soup, which never refuse…. When all are seated, send a plate of soup to every one. Do not ask anyone if they will be helped, as everyone takes it, of course.

—A
N
A
MERICAN LADY
, True Politeness,
1853

Good manners: The noise you don’t make when you’re eating soup.

—B
ENNETT
C
ERF
,
twentieth-century American humorist

In taking soup, it is necessary to avoid lifting too much in the spoon, or filling the mouth so full as to stop the breath.

—S
T
. J
OHN THE
B
APTIST DE LA
S
ALLE
,
French educator
,
The Rules of Christian Manners and Civility,
1695

Gentlemen do not take soup at luncheon.

—L
ORD
C
URZON
,
nineteenth-century British statesman

Never blow your soup if it is too hot, but wait until it cools. Never raise your plate to your lips, but eat it with a spoon.

—C. B. H
ARTLEY
, The Gentlemen’s Book of Etiquette,
1873

I discovered that dinners follow the order of creation—fish first, then entrées, then joints, lastly the apple as dessert. The soup is chaos.

—S
YLVIA
T
OWNSEND
W
ARNER
,
twentieth-century English writer

What an awful thing life is. It’s like soup with lots of hairs floating on the surface. You have to eat it nevertheless.

—G
USTAVE
F
LAUBERT
,
nineteenth-century French writer

Food probably has a very great influence on the condition of men…. Who knows if a well-prepared soup was not responsible for the pneumatic pump or a poor one for a war?

—G. C. L
ICHTENBERG
,
eighteenth-century German physicist/
philosopher
, Aphorism 14

A first-rate soup is more creative than a second rate painting.

—A
BRAHAM
M
ASLOW
,
twentieth-century American psychologist

I believe I once considerably scandalized her by declaring that clear soup was a more important factor in life than a clear conscience.

—S
AKI
(H. H. M
UNRO
), The Blind Spot,
1914

There are two types of people in this world: shlemiehls and shlimazls. A shlemiehl is the person who always spills soup, and a shlimazl is the person he spills it on. I’m the schlemiehl and you’re the shlimazl.

—J
EWISH
B
ERNSTEIN
talking to archconservative
Archie Bunker on the 1970s U.S. sitcom
All in the Family

An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup.

—H. L. M
ENCKEN
,
American journalist/critic
, Chrestomathy,
1949

Soup and fish explain half the emotions of life.

—S
YDNEY
S
MITH
,
nineteenth-century
English clergyman and wit

Whoever tells a lie cannot be pure in heart—and only the pure in heart can make good soup.

—L
UDWIG VAN
B
EETHOVEN
,
German composer, in a letter to
Mme. Streicher in 1817