The universe in a glass
Share a glass with us! Every week, The Universe in a Glass brings you the stories behind your favorite drinks and the people who love them. Join award-winning sommelier Bill Jensen as he welcomes oenophiles and bon vivants from every walk of life, be it headline makers or underground icons, wine industry luminaries or beverage-obsessed teetotalers. We each share a bottle we love and discuss all the forces that guided its journey to the glass, the people who brought it our way, and what it says about those doing the drinking.
If you like what you hear, stock up on whatever we're pouring at Reveler's Hour Wine Store just across the street from our recording studio at the historic Line Hotel in Washington, DC's Adams Morgan neighborhood. New episodes drop every Wednesday. Stay thirsty and stay tuned.
episode #20:
shakespearean wines with simon godwin
This week, we are joined by Simon Godwin, Artistic Director of Washington, DC's Shakespeare Theater Company. We mark the occasion with a flight of four of the wines most commonly featured in the Bard's work: Sherry Sack, Bordeaux Clairet, Malmsey Madeira, and Rhine Riesling. Simon reflects on his directing roots as the authoritative eldest of four siblings, the enduring lure of Shakespeare's canon, and the inclinations of audiences in the Nation's Capital. We trade lines from "Henry IV," "Richard III," "Merchant of Venice," and "Hamlet" among others, closing with Sonnet XV as Simon appraises how the Bard's taste in wine informed his verse.
There’s always wine available at Reveler’s Hour Wine Shop, but save your money for theater tickets this week.
- Learn more about the Shakespeare Theater Company.
- Take a peak at its upcoming performance schedule.
- The Washington Post profiles the Englishman tasked with selling Shakespeare to Washington audiences.
- From the other side of the pond, The Guardian sizes up "how the British director is taking on US theatre."
This week's verse comes from the Bard’s collection of Sonnets:
"Sonnet XV”
When I consider everything that grows
Holds in perfection but a little moment,
That this huge stage presenteth nought but shows
Whereon the stars in secret influence comment;
When I perceive that men as plants increase,
Cheered and check'd even by the selfsame sky,
Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease,
And wear their brave state out of memory;
Then the conceit of this inconstant stay
Sets you most rich in youth before my sight,
Where wasteful Time debateth with Decay
To change your day of youth to sullied night;
And all in war with Time for love of you,
Ashe takes from you, I engraft you new.
MORE ABOUT YOUR HOST
Bill Jensen is the Co-Owner & Beverage Director of Tail Up Goat & Reveler's Hour in the historic Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington, DC. He was honored with Michelin's 2021 Washington, DC Sommelier Award and serves on the Steering Committee for FLXcursion, an Internal Riesling Expo in the Finger Lakes. At the height of the pandemic lockdown, he launched the widely beloved Tail Up Goat Wine School which endured for two years of regular Sunday instruction. He believes that drinking should be an act of replenishment, renewal, and discovery, and that wine functions best when it is not only about what’s in the glass but becomes the sum of the place and the people who produce it.
