"Consider the many connotations of "cup"... it has definite Freudian sexual undertones... As the cup is offered to the male, Oscar notes, it is immediately pluralised into a pair in his mind and transformed into that wondrous female undergarment which invariably shapes the contours of gentle male dreams.

... At some deep subconscious level, males fear females most when they receive that nice cup of coffee from those delicate hands.

For a proffered drink, as history has shown, has always been woman's deadliest weapon against man.

She can do either of two things with it. She can put into it some secret potion (usually something related to her own body and so sinisterly obscene that even Oscar cannot mention it in his thesis) that is guaranteed to put her husband or lover under her spell forever.

Or she can administer a strong drug that will make him fall into a deep sleep, so that like Delilah or Lorena Bobbitt, she can denude him of his manhood forever.

Subservience, power, lust, fear, revenge - surely no symbol has accreted so much portentous meaning."

- Potent brew of power, lust and fear in Coffee Cup, Catherine Lim. Straits Times, 17 September 1994