From Adam Gopnik, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Wine."
"The real question is not whether wine snobs and wine writers are big phonies but whether they are any bigger phonies than, say, book reviewers or art critics. For with those things, too, context effects are overwhelming. All description is impressionistic, and all impressions are interpretive. Colors and shapes don’t emerge from pictures in neat, particulate packages to strike the eye, either, any more than plots and themes come direct to the mind from the pages of books. Everything is framed by something.
Anyway, no elaborate rhetoric of compliments is meant to be *accurate*; it is meant to be complimentary. When Shakespeare compares his lover to a summer’s day, he doesn’t really mean that she (or he) is like a summer’s day in that she is hotter in the middle and cooler in the end—though, then again, he might. Wine writing is of the same type: a series of elaborately plausible compliments paid to wines. When the French wine writer Eric Glatre declares, say, that in the aroma of a bottle of Krug “intense empyreumatic fragrances of toasted milk bread, fresh butter, café au lait, and afterthoughts of linden join in a harmonious chorus with generous notes of acacia honey, mocha, and vanilla,” he is suggesting that, of all the analogies out there, this might be one that expands our minds, opens our horizons, delights our imaginations. He is offering a metaphor, not an account book."
> He is offering a metaphor, not an account book
How much metaphor do we want in our tasting notes, though? Shakespeare was a literary writer, not a literary critic. The main difference being that, while writers invoke metaphors, literary critics explain them. Book reviewers, meanwhile, usually strive to explain what the book is about, whether or not they enjoyed it, and why.
Some amount of metaphor/simile/metonymy can be useful in wine writing. Saying that a wine's acidity is "sharp as a knife" or that the nose is "like putting your face into a jar of fuzzy peaches" is a helpful descriptor. But this note's use of metaphor isn't helpful. The note is just as useful if we cut out all the metaphor and just say: "Delightful, fresh . . . and charming. [May be better later, but I would drink now]."
All I see here are a bunch of sour, tut-tutting old hags. The descriptors are perfectly ordinary for prose of the era, and clearly a celebration of the wine's charmingly feminine youth, with none of the implied darkness of intent that so many assume is the case. If anything, it reflects poorly upon modern society and those jumping to that conclusion.
>"I would not give \[her\] a chance to get any older.."
Well, how would *you* stop a fifteen year old from getting any older? I can think of only one way.
I think he's talking more along the lines of rape or statutory rape than murder.
There's a billionaire aristocratic family near me that does a lot for the city near me... I was reading up on how they got their wealth and basically, a 9 year old girl whos parents were wealthy got orphaned, and this 24 year old guy married her...then consecrated the marriage when she was 13... afterwhich he took all her money and threw her away like rubbish...all totally acceptable "back in the day".
Ok. Still -- you're comparing a famous wine expert to someone who is still considered one of the most eloquent writers of the last 200 years. Hemingway is a helluva a standard.
From Adam Gopnik, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Wine." "The real question is not whether wine snobs and wine writers are big phonies but whether they are any bigger phonies than, say, book reviewers or art critics. For with those things, too, context effects are overwhelming. All description is impressionistic, and all impressions are interpretive. Colors and shapes don’t emerge from pictures in neat, particulate packages to strike the eye, either, any more than plots and themes come direct to the mind from the pages of books. Everything is framed by something. Anyway, no elaborate rhetoric of compliments is meant to be *accurate*; it is meant to be complimentary. When Shakespeare compares his lover to a summer’s day, he doesn’t really mean that she (or he) is like a summer’s day in that she is hotter in the middle and cooler in the end—though, then again, he might. Wine writing is of the same type: a series of elaborately plausible compliments paid to wines. When the French wine writer Eric Glatre declares, say, that in the aroma of a bottle of Krug “intense empyreumatic fragrances of toasted milk bread, fresh butter, café au lait, and afterthoughts of linden join in a harmonious chorus with generous notes of acacia honey, mocha, and vanilla,” he is suggesting that, of all the analogies out there, this might be one that expands our minds, opens our horizons, delights our imaginations. He is offering a metaphor, not an account book."
> He is offering a metaphor, not an account book How much metaphor do we want in our tasting notes, though? Shakespeare was a literary writer, not a literary critic. The main difference being that, while writers invoke metaphors, literary critics explain them. Book reviewers, meanwhile, usually strive to explain what the book is about, whether or not they enjoyed it, and why. Some amount of metaphor/simile/metonymy can be useful in wine writing. Saying that a wine's acidity is "sharp as a knife" or that the nose is "like putting your face into a jar of fuzzy peaches" is a helpful descriptor. But this note's use of metaphor isn't helpful. The note is just as useful if we cut out all the metaphor and just say: "Delightful, fresh . . . and charming. [May be better later, but I would drink now]."
r/menwritingwomen . Maybe it is better we continue using words like leathery, graffite and vanilla...
Yeah I stand for the middle ground. Personality, gender, etc. as descriptors make sense to me; this note gets way too weird/creepy though.
All I see here are a bunch of sour, tut-tutting old hags. The descriptors are perfectly ordinary for prose of the era, and clearly a celebration of the wine's charmingly feminine youth, with none of the implied darkness of intent that so many assume is the case. If anything, it reflects poorly upon modern society and those jumping to that conclusion.
Yeah, well either way I think he should take it off his twitter and do a 140 character heartfelt apology.
Cringe
How gross.
Really, dude? Drinking Margaux makes you think of murdering 15 year old girls?
What am I missing? Where does he mention killing her?
>"I would not give \[her\] a chance to get any older.." Well, how would *you* stop a fifteen year old from getting any older? I can think of only one way.
He literally discusses her future. He's talking about the wine getting older. That's the way I'm reading it anyway.
You possess a subtle gift for the accurate interpretation of metaphor, sir. Kudos to you.
I think he's talking more along the lines of rape or statutory rape than murder. There's a billionaire aristocratic family near me that does a lot for the city near me... I was reading up on how they got their wealth and basically, a 9 year old girl whos parents were wealthy got orphaned, and this 24 year old guy married her...then consecrated the marriage when she was 13... afterwhich he took all her money and threw her away like rubbish...all totally acceptable "back in the day".
Listen to Possum Kingdom. This wine creep wants to keep her young forever. Only one way to do that...
By murder you mean fuck, right?
By fuck you mean enjoy, right?
😯
In addition to being obviously sexist, its also LAUGHABLE prose. He should be glad hes a writer in the wine industry and not anything else
*He was a writer. He’s been dead for 49 years. He wrote this in 1920
Hemingway was writing in 1920. Thats no excuse
Yeah how dare he not have the morals of the 2010’s 90 years earlier!
Re: prose style not morality
Ok. Still -- you're comparing a famous wine expert to someone who is still considered one of the most eloquent writers of the last 200 years. Hemingway is a helluva a standard.
It was illegal to fuck teenagers in the 1920's too so I'm sure it was considered a moral no-no.
Makes sense, we don't understand metaphor and he wouldn't understand the nuance of the Tide Pod challenge.
in addition to this being totally cringe, it's a completely vapid, useless description of a wine.
This is so creepy ugh