Raymond Blake is fearful about the growing anti-alcohol movement and its negative consequences, but remains a strong proponent of wine drunk in moderation and the joy it has brought over millenia
“Those who forget their history are condemned to repeat it.” That quote from George Santayana — and its multiplicity of versions attributed to others, such as Winston Churchill — is regularly trotted out as a stern warning to any whose zeal to implement a favoured policy or practice blinds them to possible negative consequences. It could well be applied to the wine and drinks world of today for, no matter the quote’s exact wording or who is credited as its author, its essential truth remains the same — not to be blinded by or overlook the consequences.
Yet, will anybody learn from it and use it as a guiding principle for their words and actions? In the case of the wine world I fear not, given the current demonisation of alcohol and the growing anti-alcohol movement that is spreading across the globe. Wine is now a villain, not the bringer of joy that all its lovers know it to be. So let us look back for a moment to try and see forward, to try and learn from history.
It is a little over a century since Prohibition was introduced in the United States. As I once wrote, if ever a piece of legislation spawned unintended consequences it was the Volstead Act, which added the 18th Amendment to the United States’ constitution and came into force in January 1920. It marked the end of a long campaign by the temperance movement against the evils of alcohol, dating back to Maine going dry in 1851. After that, state followed state and over 30 were dry by the advent of the First World War. Worthy motives begat clumsy methods, as a legion of short-sighted do-gooders got their way, sowing the wind with no thought for the whirlwind. They cannot have guessed what lay ahead.
Given the current demonisation of alcohol and the growing anti-alcohol movement that is spreading across the globe. Wine is now a villain, not the bringer of joy that all its lovers know it to be
Rather than saving the country from the scourge of alcohol, Prohibition did the opposite, while facilitating the rise of organised crime. Cynicism polluted public life; law-breaking by otherwise law-abiding citizens was validated. Official America infected itself with a hydra-headed monster that has never been properly tamed. Though it lasted little more than a dozen years, its effects far outlived the 1933 repeal of the act. This was Prohibition’s enduring bequest to the nation.
The key point to take away from this glance back in time is to note that the introduction of nationwide prohibition came almost 70 years after the first state went “dry”. Who is to say that after an equivalent timespan from now, as the end of the 21st century approaches, a similarly sweeping ban on alcohol will not be imposed in countries where today a glass or two of wine in the evening is being viewed as an endangerment to one’s health, a possible carcinogen?
Not for a moment do I want to downplay the dangers of overconsumption, that would be illconsidered and irresponsible, but an extreme view, as propounded by the World Health Organisation, that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption is alarmist and unhelpful. It is akin to saying there is no safe speed at which you can drive your motor car. Temperance advocates have seized on this and, while they may say that outright prohibition is not their aim, they cannot speak for their successors a few decades hence. Who is to say that a future generation will not build on their predecessors’ “achievement” in opening the door for ever increasing restrictions on the production and sale of wine and other drinks? Right now, this probably sounds like scaremongering but it is the direction in which we are moving.
Meanwhile, the current level of debate around the broad issue of alcohol in society leaves something to be desired, as it seems to be based on little more than point scoring from one side or the other. Claim is met by counter-claim: data has been misrepresented; a study upon which damning conclusions were based was conducted in a slipshod fashion; statistics have been bent to support a vacuous argument. And so on. Sometimes the tenor of the debate is little better than the pantomime backand- forth of: “Oh, yes you did!’ and “Oh, no I didn’t!”
Within the confines of this article it is not my intention to get bogged into the arguments, I simply want to sound a warning note. It pains me to write this bleak epistle but any wine lover who wilfully ignores current trends might be in for a nasty comeuppance. But enough of the grim stuff. What about the joy?
My wife and I spent Christmas 2024 in Burgundy. On the Sunday before the big day we invited some winemaking neighbours for a languid Sunday lunch that spanned most of the afternoon. It was a joyous occasion made all the more special by an eclectic quartet of wines that I pulled from the cellar for the occasion: Domaine Ramonet, Chassagne- Montrachet 1er cru Boudriotte 2004; Domaine Fourrier, Gevrey- Chambertin 1er cru Combe aux Moines Vieille Vigne 2007; Philippe Pacalet, Pernand-Vergelesses 2009; and Domaine Lucien Muzard, Santenay 1er cru Clos Faubard 2005.
Each wine prompted animated discussion and debate, there was talk of winemaking practices and current fashions, vintage characteristics and vineyard locations. It was the latter that received most “airtime” — the sense of place being so important for a wine’s identity in Burgundy.
Boudriotte is a small vineyard that falls under the large umbrella of Morgeot and at 20 years old the wine was plump and succulent with a satin texture. Combe aux Moines is the most interesting of the four, lying close to the famed Clos Saint-Jacques but more rugged, thanks to a vertical wall of stone that forms the western boundary of the vineyard and which reflects heat onto the vines. There is even a stone statue of a monk, elevated so that he can oversee the vineyard. Some of that ruggedness was reflected in the wine. Pernand- Vergelesses lies off the “main drag” of the Côte d’Or, tucked in behind the Hill of Corton, and thanks to the fact that its vineyards face each other across a small valley, with widely varying aspects, it lacks as clear an identity as, for instance, Chambolle- Musigny or Puligny-Montrachet. Yet in Pacalet’s hands the 2009 lacked for nothing by way of bracing impact on the palate. The Clos Faubard vineyard is bounded by great banks of stones, murgers, that act as a heat reservoir after a sunny day, resulting in a wine with a firm backbone, particularly this one from the warm 2005 vintage.
A few days later I went for a walk in the frozen vineyards with another winemaker, delighting in the conversation as we made our way hither and thither, commenting on the complex and endlessly fascinating warp and weft of the slopes: Here, a newly-planted vineyard using individual stakes to support the vines, rather than the regular wires strung between sturdy posts at the end of each row; there, a patch of land that had been recently cleared of a jumble of old sheds to allow for the planting of a couple of hundred vines.
The Côte d’Or has been worked in some shape or form for about 2,000 years, and in a well-documented fashion for the last thousand. Much more recently, in 2015 UNESCO World Heritage status was granted to the côte, recognising its cultural significance, whereby natural potential was harnessed by the hand of man to create a product of haunting beauty and worldwide renown. To damn that activity and its practitioners, even by inference, is to blind oneself to its enduring significance, even if such a position chimes with the zeitgeist of the wider world, reflecting the neopuritan age in which we live.
And the Côte d’Or is not the only region so blessed, there are many other enchanting sources of wine on this earth, I just happen to know Burgundy best but included in their number are, in no particular order: the picture postcard South African winelands around Stellenbosch and Franschoek; the wondrous Mosel Valley and its tributaries; the rugged, jaw-dropping vistas of the Douro Valley; the isolated splendour of Chile’s Elqui Valley; the magical hills of Piedmont; the bucolic Margaret River region in Western Australia; the manicured beauty of Alsace and its equally poised wines; and the Fingers Lakes region in upstate New York, especially when the leaves are falling in autumn. Which is not to forget Bordeaux, whose vast vinous bounty easily qualifies it as the wine world’s capital.
What the above illustrates is the great gift that wine is to mankind. Each place has its own special story, encapsulated in its wines, which can be enjoyed all over the world. These are stories not just worth telling, not just worth listening to but, above all, worth preserving. It behoves every wine lover to do so. Famed English wine writer, Hugh Johnson, once opined that wine’s great gift was its “Power to banish care.” I go a step further and say that it has the “Power to bring joy.” It is time to celebrate that joy; to cherish that joy; to defend that joy.