AMB Cote d'Azur

Adventures in the new French wine country

THROUGH A GLASS LIGHTLY
 
Many people feel inhibited about reading books about wine.  Some because, though they like drinking the stuff, they don’t want to get bogged down in the details of how it’s made.  Some because they don’t want to hear the praises sung of grand wines or great vintages that they will never taste themselves.  Others again are simply put off by the absurd descriptions employed by wine snobs  –  ‘I can definitely detect notes of pencil-sharpenings’ and so on.  However, many of us would like to know just a little more than we do, provided that we can avoid those problems.
 
Even so, would we want to read a book about French wines by an American?  One published by a university?  In both cases, the answer is a very definite yes.  The author is a distinguished journalist, not an academic, and the book, though it comes from an American university, is part of a collection on food and drink from the same source under the title At Table. In this case, the answer is a very definite yes.  Robert V. Camuto who nowadays lives with his family in the south of France has written a book about wine that is also essentially a book about the people who make it and where the industry in France is currently heading. His story is of a man who enjoyed wine, was interested in it but not particularly knowledgeable about it, and how he set about correcting that in the course of forays in most of the French wine-growing areas. In the course of a dozen chapters, he introduces us to some of today’s more imaginative growers and winemakers, describing both them and their vineyards in a graphic style that homes in on the significant detail to light up his narrative.
 
This style reflects a long background in journalism, which is particularly relevant here because, in a sense, the book also represents a report from the front line of an ongoing battle between an industry, demoralised by its loss of status among newer competitors and willing to pander to the tastes of an ignorant public if it will pay the price, and a younger generation dedicated to recovering an authenticity that was in danger of being lost forever.  Most of the winemakers profiled here fall into the second category.  Most of them avoid the use of chemicals, either totally or as far as they deem practical, some grow ‘bio’ wines and one goes to the extremes of timing his processing to the phases of the moon and arcane astrological influences.
 
There can be a particular pleasure in hearing somebody discussing a topic about which they are knowledgeable and feel strongly, even if you do not share their particular passion. Here we have that effect twice over, as the winemakers explain to the willing ears of Camuto just what they are up to, and he passes on to us what he has learned, with the confidence of a man who knows what he is talking about.
 
We follow Camuto’s travels around France, feel for him as he groans at the stress of grape-picking on rarely-used muscles, join him at wine exhibitions, tastings and even the annual celebrations at Beaune.  He proves an interesting and progressively knowledgeable companion and one whose sense of humour undercuts any tendency to take things too seriously  –  although certainly as seriously as they deserve.
 
If you fancy the opportunity to take on board some interesting information on where your next bottle of wine may be coming from, or going to, without being blinded by science or talked down to by self-appointed experts, this is the book for you.  I found it thoroughly enjoyable.

 

A further pleasure of Corkscrewed is that it is very attractively produced in terms of layout, the quality of binding and paper, and overall design, down to the use of an unfamiliar serif typeface, Sabon, for the text which is easy on the eye.  The presentation is let down a little by the reproduction of photographs:  I suspect that the pictures shown here in monochrome were originally in colour, which has led to reduced contrast and clarity, but that is a minor flaw in a generally excellent presentation.

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Corkscrewed by Robert V. Camuto
Published in hardback by University of Nebraska Press, 191pp
 
ISBN 978-0-8032-7635-2, US$ 24.95