In 1926: living at the edge of time - Monoskop

BARS 37
tion like grammars. As if bars and pleasures were languages, they are
based on the principle of choosing from a finite number of basic elements.
These elements are then transformed into a multiplicity of composite
products-cocktails as well as long nights filled with different
forms of sensual enjoyment. The series of composite products that can
be generated according to this principle is open-ended, and the individuality
of each of these products stands out against a background of infinite
variation.
Describing the Shanghai Club as "the world's greatest bar," Paul
Morand combines the grammar of cocktails with the grammar of pleasures:
"the libertine cocktail, the 'Kiss-me-Quick'; the sentimental 'Love's
Dream'; the poetic 'September Morn'; the 'Sensation'" (76). With even
greater obsessiveness, Morand projects the grammar of cocktails onto
the geographic map of the world:
Cocktails of concentrated ingredients, which become even more concentrated
when chilled-a sudden union of forces that had been lost
when each was in its own bottle, a distillation of happiness received in
one punch (where is the gentle caress of wines?), supreme balm of the
tropics. Without speaking here of all our ordinary cocktails, observe
merely the "Bamboo Cocktail" of the Anglo-Indians, the "Blenton" of
the Royal Navy, the "Hula-Hula" of the Hawaiian Islands, the "Gin­
Fizz" of the P. and O. steamliners. Sometimes, too, the sweet cocktails
of southern lands: the "Sol y Sombra" of San Sebastian (like the "sun"
and "shade" of arenas); the "chocolate cocktails" of the Brazilianschartreuse,
port, and fresh chocolate powder; and the "Gibson" of
Yokohama, so unique with its white onion; not to mention the
"H. P. W. Vanderbilt" and the "Bennett," baptized with the names of
great billionaires by an obsequious bartender; finally the "minnenoaba"
or "laughing water" of the Indians. (74f£.)
Since cocktails connote lightness and lightness connotes traveling, bars
and maps are frequently associated in people's minds. Walter Benjamin,
in the entry "Stehbierhalle" ("Stand-Up Beer Hall") of his Einbahnstra{?e,
highlights this very association between traveling and drinking
as the most characteristic feature of the sailor: "The sailor hates the
sea, and to him the subtlest nuances speak ... He lives on the open sea
in a city, where, on the Cannebiere of Marseilles, a Port Said bar faces a
Hamburg whorehouse and the Neapolitan Castell dell'Ovo stands on