Books and booze

Well, I am just shocked, I tell you: according to Atlas Obscura, book clubs have always been focused on gossip and drinking, just as much (if not more) as they've been focused on reading. Apparently, Branwell Brontë was a member of a book club that imposed a strongly-worded rule: no member should drink so much "that [they] be offensive to the company". I've been to book club meetings where that rule would have damn useful.