Smoking as a Fine Art by A. A. Milne

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Elric

Lifer
Sep 19, 2019
2,185
9,826
Liplapper Lane (Michigan)
tobaccocellar.com
I couldn't resist sharing this. Pipe smokers have been arguing many of the same topics for decades, apparently.

Mods, please move to a more appropriate location as you see fit.


My first introduction to Lady Nicotine was at the innocent age of eight, when, finding a small piece of somebody else's tobacco lying unclaimed on the ground, I decided to experiment with it. Numerous desert island stories had told me that the pangs of hunger could be allayed by chewing tobacco; it was thus that the hero staved off death before discovering the bread-fruit tree. Every right-minded boy of eight hopes to be shipwrecked one day, and it was proper that I should find out for myself whether my authorities could be trusted in this matter. So I chewed tobacco. In the sense that I certainly did not desire food for some time afterwards, my experience justified the authorities, but I felt at the time that it was not so much for staving off death as for reconciling oneself to it that tobacco-chewing was to be recommended. I have never practised it since.

At eighteen I went to Cambridge, and bought two pipes in a case. In those days Greek was compulsory, but not more so than two pipes in a case. One of the pipes had an amber stem and the other a vulcanite stem, and both of them had silver belts. That also was compulsory. Having bought them, one was free to smoke cigarettes. However, at the end of my first year I got to work seriously on a shilling briar, and I have smoked that, or something like it, ever since.

In the last four years there has grown up a new school of pipe- smokers, by which (I suspect) I am hardly regarded as a pipe- smoker at all. This school buys its pipes always at one particular shop; its pupils would as soon think of smoking a pipe without the white spot as of smoking brown paper. So far are they from smoking brown paper that each one of them has his tobacco specially blended according to the colour of his hair, his taste in revues, and the locality in which he lives. The first blend is naturally not the ideal one. It is only when he has been a confirmed smoker for at least three months, and knows the best and worst of all tobaccos, that his exact requirements can be satisfied.

However, it is the pipe rather than the tobacco which marks him as belonging to this particular school. He pins his faith, not so much to its labour-saving devices as to the white spot outside, the white spot of an otherwise aimless life. This tells the world that it is one of THE pipes. Never was an announcement more superfluous. From the moment, shortly after breakfast, when he strikes his first match to the moment, just before bed-time, when he strikes his hundredth, it is obviously THE pipe which he is smoking.

For whereas men of an older school, like myself, smoke for the pleasure of smoking, men of this school smoke for the pleasure of pipe-owning—of selecting which of their many white-spotted pipes they will fill with their specially-blended tobacco, of filling the one so chosen, of lighting it, of taking it from the mouth to gaze lovingly at the white spot and thus letting it go out, of lighting it again and letting it go out again, of polishing it up with their own special polisher and putting it to bed, and then the pleasure of beginning all over again with another white- spotted one. They are not so much pipe-smokers as pipe-keepers; and to have spoken as I did just now of their owning pipes was wrong, for it is they who are in bondage to the white spot. This school is founded firmly on four years of war. When at the age of eighteen you are suddenly given a cheque-book and called "Sir," you must do something by way of acknowledgment. A pipe in the mouth makes it clear that there has been no mistake—you are undoubtedly a man. But you may be excused for feeling after the first pipe that the joys of smoking have been rated too high, and for trying to extract your pleasure from the polish on the pipe's surface, the pride of possessing a special mixture of your own, and such-like matters, rather than from the actual inspiration and expiration of smoke. In the same way a man not fond of reading may find delight in a library of well-bound books. They are pleasant to handle, pleasant to talk about, pleasant to show to friends. But it is the man without the library of well-bound books who generally does most of the reading.

So I feel that it is we of the older school who do most of the smoking. We smoke unconsciously while we are doing other things; THEY try, but not very successfully, to do other things while they are consciously smoking. No doubt they despise us, and tell themselves that we are not real smokers, but I fancy that they feel a little uneasy sometimes. For my young friends are always trying to persuade me to join their school, to become one of the white-spotted ones. I have no desire to be of their company, but I am prepared to make a suggestion to the founder of the school. It is that he should invent a pipe, white spot and all, which smokes itself. His pupils could hang it in the mouth as picturesquely as before, but the incidental bother of keeping it alight would no longer trouble them.
 

Chasing Embers

Captain of the Black Frigate
Nov 12, 2014
43,256
108,360
Posted on and off again here over the years.

 

Elric

Lifer
Sep 19, 2019
2,185
9,826
Liplapper Lane (Michigan)
tobaccocellar.com
Posted on and off again here over the years.

LOL, I apparently only searched post titles.
 

Flopoz

Lurker
Feb 6, 2023
13
13
I couldn't resist sharing this. Pipe smokers have been arguing many of the same topics for decades, apparently.

Mods, please move to a more appropriate location as you see fit.


My first introduction to Lady Nicotine was at the innocent age of eight, when, finding a small piece of somebody else's tobacco lying unclaimed on the ground, I decided to experiment with it. Numerous desert island stories had told me that the pangs of hunger could be allayed by chewing tobacco; it was thus that the hero staved off death before discovering the bread-fruit tree. Every right-minded boy of eight hopes to be shipwrecked one day, and it was proper that I should find out for myself whether my authorities could be trusted in this matter. So I chewed tobacco. In the sense that I certainly did not desire food for some time afterwards, my experience justified the authorities, but I felt at the time that it was not so much for staving off death as for reconciling oneself to it that tobacco-chewing was to be recommended. I have never practised it since.

At eighteen I went to Cambridge, and bought two pipes in a case. In those days Greek was compulsory, but not more so than two pipes in a case. One of the pipes had an amber stem and the other a vulcanite stem, and both of them had silver belts. That also was compulsory. Having bought them, one was free to smoke cigarettes. However, at the end of my first year I got to work seriously on a shilling briar, and I have smoked that, or something like it, ever since.

In the last four years there has grown up a new school of pipe- smokers, by which (I suspect) I am hardly regarded as a pipe- smoker at all. This school buys its pipes always at one particular shop; its pupils would as soon think of smoking a pipe without the white spot as of smoking brown paper. So far are they from smoking brown paper that each one of them has his tobacco specially blended according to the colour of his hair, his taste in revues, and the locality in which he lives. The first blend is naturally not the ideal one. It is only when he has been a confirmed smoker for at least three months, and knows the best and worst of all tobaccos, that his exact requirements can be satisfied.

However, it is the pipe rather than the tobacco which marks him as belonging to this particular school. He pins his faith, not so much to its labour-saving devices as to the white spot outside, the white spot of an otherwise aimless life. This tells the world that it is one of THE pipes. Never was an announcement more superfluous. From the moment, shortly after breakfast, when he strikes his first match to the moment, just before bed-time, when he strikes his hundredth, it is obviously THE pipe which he is smoking.

For whereas men of an older school, like myself, smoke for the pleasure of smoking, men of this school smoke for the pleasure of pipe-owning—of selecting which of their many white-spotted pipes they will fill with their specially-blended tobacco, of filling the one so chosen, of lighting it, of taking it from the mouth to gaze lovingly at the white spot and thus letting it go out, of lighting it again and letting it go out again, of polishing it up with their own special polisher and putting it to bed, and then the pleasure of beginning all over again with another white- spotted one. They are not so much pipe-smokers as pipe-keepers; and to have spoken as I did just now of their owning pipes was wrong, for it is they who are in bondage to the white spot. This school is founded firmly on four years of war. When at the age of eighteen you are suddenly given a cheque-book and called "Sir," you must do something by way of acknowledgment. A pipe in the mouth makes it clear that there has been no mistake—you are undoubtedly a man. But you may be excused for feeling after the first pipe that the joys of smoking have been rated too high, and for trying to extract your pleasure from the polish on the pipe's surface, the pride of possessing a special mixture of your own, and such-like matters, rather than from the actual inspiration and expiration of smoke. In the same way a man not fond of reading may find delight in a library of well-bound books. They are pleasant to handle, pleasant to talk about, pleasant to show to friends. But it is the man without the library of well-bound books who generally does most of the reading.
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So I feel that it is we of the older school who do most of the smoking. We smoke unconsciously while we are doing other things; THEY try, but not very successfully, to do other things while they are consciously smoking. No doubt they despise us, and tell themselves that we are not real smokers, but I fancy that they feel a little uneasy sometimes. For my young friends are always trying to persuade me to join their school, to become one of the white-spotted ones. I have no desire to be of their company, but I am prepared to make a suggestion to the founder of the school. It is that he should invent a pipe, white spot and all, which smokes itself. His pupils could hang it in the mouth as picturesquely as before, but the incidental bother of keeping it alight would no longer trouble them.
Cool, my story is strikingly similar to yours!
 
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mortonbriar

Lifer
Oct 25, 2013
2,653
5,663
New Zealand
So today Milne would be smoking Smokers Pride in a Grabow?
I always took this as a low class boy offended by the boys born rich.
Reverse snobbery at its best.
He's just having a witty eye roll at humanity (and himself) in my opinion, I guess that's what I get from most of his writing.
This is great.

Currently re-reading the Winnie-the-Pooh stories to my kids.
I have been recently too, and there was a certain point where Eeyore says "Not that it matters" and I realised that was his quote for the book title!
 

sablebrush52

The Bard Of Barlings
Jun 15, 2013
19,632
44,858
Southern Oregon
jrs457.wixsite.com
I remember this bit of Milne from before. Even then, Dunhill was a cult.

But in a larger sense, this forum offers plenty of grist for Milne's mill. As a collector of Barlings and several other marques, I would undoubtedly be considered a suspect sort. And anyone with a cellar would be as well. Collecting pipes is bad enough, especially "show" pipes, but collecting tobaccos? Whatever would Milne make of the Esoterica and McClelland worship?

Milne's view of a pipe smoker as performing this activity as naturally and matter of factly as breathing runs counter to a large percentage of this forum's posted content, and by inference, a large portion of its participants.

We are, to put it plainly, a pile of poseurs.

Milne may be onto something, given how much angst gets expressed over whether or not one is smoking correctly, an example being the amount and composition of dottle, or even it's existence at all, being testament to the unhappy and unnatural side of obsessing over details rather than keeping it simple, enjoying the experience and having some faith.
 

jpberg

Lifer
Aug 30, 2011
2,905
6,545
I remember this bit of Milne from before. Even then, Dunhill was a cult.

But in a larger sense, this forum offers plenty of grist for Milne's mill. As a collector of Barlings and several other marques, I would undoubtedly be considered a suspect sort. And anyone with a cellar would be as well. Collecting pipes is bad enough, especially "show" pipes, but collecting tobaccos? Whatever would Milne make of the Esoterica and McClelland worship?

Milne's view of a pipe smoker as performing this activity as naturally and matter of factly as breathing runs counter to a large percentage of this forum's posted content, and by inference, a large portion of its participants.

We are, to put it plainly, a pile of poseurs.

Milne may be onto something, given how much angst gets expressed over whether or not one is smoking correctly, an example being the amount and composition of dottle, or even it's existence at all, being testament to the unhappy and unnatural side of obsessing over details rather than keeping it simple, enjoying the experience and having some faith.
Wait! What?
 

mortonbriar

Lifer
Oct 25, 2013
2,653
5,663
New Zealand
I remember this bit of Milne from before. Even then, Dunhill was a cult.

But in a larger sense, this forum offers plenty of grist for Milne's mill. As a collector of Barlings and several other marques, I would undoubtedly be considered a suspect sort. And anyone with a cellar would be as well. Collecting pipes is bad enough, especially "show" pipes, but collecting tobaccos? Whatever would Milne make of the Esoterica and McClelland worship?

Milne's view of a pipe smoker as performing this activity as naturally and matter of factly as breathing runs counter to a large percentage of this forum's posted content, and by inference, a large portion of its participants.

We are, to put it plainly, a pile of poseurs.

Milne may be onto something, given how much angst gets expressed over whether or not one is smoking correctly, an example being the amount and composition of dottle, or even it's existence at all, being testament to the unhappy and unnatural side of obsessing over details rather than keeping it simple, enjoying the experience and having some faith.
Sure, but to be fair on the forum members of today the context Milne was in was (the book was published 1919) one which had pipes and tobacco as a very normal part of a staple diet and lifestyle, with close to 100 years ahead of it before worrying about tobacco being hard to source, or much restricted access to places to smoke.

I actually thought 'poser' had both positive and negative connotations. Now I see there is 'poser' and 'poseur', so there is education to be found in this pile of poseurs if you are willing to dig!