![\"OLYMPUS](\"http:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/provencerose-500x333.jpg\")
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Well respected US author John Bonn\u00e9 has just written an article on Provence ros\u00e9<\/a> for Punch<\/em>. He\u2019s a clever writer, and understands how to construct an article, but I felt on this occasion he\u2019d just got it very wrong. So I thought I\u2019d write a response.<\/p>\n According to Bonn\u00e9, the success of Provence ros\u00e9 is a problem. He\u2019s struggling to find the real heart of Provence, as expressed in its wines, and feels that the huge momentum behind ros\u00e9 is leading to a standard product winning out over more authentic wines that have a better connection to the soul of the place.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a familiar narrative to any American wine lover who has grown up with Kermit Lynch, whose excellent book Adventures on the Wine Route<\/em> has been hugely influential for a generation of US wine people (indeed, Bonn\u00e9 quotes Lynch in his piece). The narrative? Idealistic American (Lynch, in this case) travels to France looking to source wines. \u2018Discovers\u2019 (of course, they didn\u2019t exist before they were discovered by said earnest American) amazing producers making wines traditionally. But they are in grave peril! Modernity is on the march! Stainless steel, cultured yeasts, filtration: all these things are looking to destroy the amazing wines that the American has discovered. But relax: the American will save the French from themselves.<\/p>\n Early in his piece, Bonn\u00e9 acknowledges the way that ros\u00e9 seems to capture the essence of Provence quite well:<\/p>\n Its pink wines\u00a0are an easily accessible totem of the Proven\u00e7al good life\u2014pure Mediterranean idyll in a bottle.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But, to him, this is a problem.<\/p>\n The net effect of the surging popularity is that Provence now represents little more than a lifestyle (or a simplified interpretation of a lifestyle). It\u2019s not just that the wines have become boring; it\u2019s that ros\u00e9\u2019s deeper cultural relevance there has been whittled down to a vague fashionability.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n This is surprising, because when I visit Provence, I see one of the wine world\u2019s few success stories<\/a>. Provence has taken, whether deliberately or not, the wise choice to do one thing well<\/a>, and to lead with this on export markets. There\u2019s a wonderful concordance between the product \u2013 pink wine \u2013 and the \u2018brand\u2019 image of Provence, as Bonn\u00e9 points out above. This resonates with export markets. When we drink a bottle or Provence ros\u00e9, we are transported to this magical place of sun, sea, blue skies, large yachts, fashionable people, al fresco dining and glamour. And this is a problem?<\/p>\n And ros\u00e9 is now much better than it used to be. Advances in pressing techniques, better vineyard work, and the fact that this is now a profitable wine so there\u2019s a premium to be had for better quality, have resulted in much nicer wines. I\u2019ve been visiting Provence since I was a child, and this new wave of ros\u00e9 isn\u2019t supplanting artisinally made authentic wine; it\u2019s replacing cheap plonk.<\/p>\n Bonn\u00e9 complains:<\/p>\n A bowl of saffroned, garlicky fish stew or a tranche of the onion tart known as pissaladi\u00e8re, plus a glass of salmon-hued\u00a0wine, used to be the sort of simple pleasure that transported foreigners. But 40 years of fetishization, then a final shove from the ros\u00e9 craze, have pushed Provence into clich\u00e9 territory.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But surely Bonn\u00e9 is fetishizing himself, trying to fit each wine region into his Lynchian narrative? Provence just won\u2019t fit, so there must be something wrong here, right?<\/p>\n Americans like Bonn\u00e9 travel to France looking for a great, authentic cultural experience. They are looking to validate their aesthetic sensibilities by experiencing this connection between gastronomy and culture. They want to participate in the good life of the modestly poor people of southern Europe; eat where they eat, avoid fellow tourists, and immerse themselves in a rich culture of food and wine. They arrive, and are affronted when they find that things have changed. They are somewhat distressed when they find winegrowers driving expensive German cars rather than a beaten up 2CV.<\/p>\n Of course, this isn\u2019t so much a piece about Provence wine, as it is about Bonn\u00e9 and his expectations. It is a lament that he can\u2019t indulge his fantasy. He is at the center of this piece as much as he is in some of his other work, and I think this is a weakness. He\u2019s clearly a very talented writer. He would be stronger if he could remove himself a little. The New California was a brave and important book, but he can give the impression that he thinks he was instrumental in bringing about a shift (in some small pockets of Californian wine) to more balanced styles, rather than chronicling this shift. In this sense, he seems like a surfer trying to take credit for a remarkable wave.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve written this response, because I think that those of us in the wine world should be celebrating (and learning from) the great success of Provence ros\u00e9, instead of lamenting it. This is a region where innovation is welcomed. Rather than knock the producers who toy with unusual bottle shapes, we should be applauding them. Normal people are responding to these wines, and are prepared to pay good money for them. In a context where large swathes of the wine industry struggle to be profitable, this is something that needs to be welcomed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Well respected US author John Bonn\u00e9 has just written an article on Provence ros\u00e9 for Punch. He\u2019s a clever writer, and understands how to construct an article, but I felt…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[162,163],"tags":[408,409],"class_list":["post-14652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-provence","category-rose","tag-provence","tag-rose"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14652"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14652\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14658,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14652\/revisions\/14658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"OLYMPUS](\"http:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/roseprovenceleoube-500x333.jpg\")
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