This is no stodgy dissertation on wine and how
it’s made. With the very first sentence of The
Grail, Brian Doyle uncorks a full-bodied work of
enthusiastic storytelling. The Grail delivers on
the promise of its subtitle: A Year Ambling and Shambling
Through an Oregon Vineyard in Pursuit of the Best Pinot Noir Wine
in the Whole Wild World. Doyle, author of six books and
the editor of Portland Magazine, writes as if
adjectives are about to be discontinued and run-on sentences
outlawed. When the dictionary’s words aren’t enough, he
creates his own: “I wander up the next morning, on what
appears to be the most crisp clear brilliant sundrenched birdsung
hawkhovering day in the history of the world.”
Twenty-something winemaker Jesse Lange, on the other hand, relies
on one all-purpose word: “Cool.”
Doyle
describes both the momentary and the momentous as he follows Jesse
Lange and his father, Don, through the crackling color and mad
motion of making world-famous wines in the hills of Dundee, Ore. It
makes for an entertaining, sometimes hilarious narrative. “
‘How do you know the right moment for harvest?’ I ask,
trying to stay focused on the matter at hand and not think about
the wild seething scene in the vineyard, the vines fertilizing each
other madly when no one is looking, the little tiny bras, the
little tiny cigarettes, the recriminations at dawn.”
But the holy grail may be in peril. A January issue of
the Eugene, Ore., Register Guard noted that
“climate change could lead to hotter, drier heat waves,
heavier rains and quicker snowmelts in the future, scientists say
— and a change in the taste of Oregon’s signature pinot
noir wines could also be on the horizon.”
In an
interview, Jesse Lange agrees: “Global climate change is an
issue that we are just beginning to see the effects of, and those
effects will undoubtedly increase exponentially.” But
he’s not giving up. “My generation in the valley has
been given a legacy to uphold, to care for, to improve upon, with
all the creativity and respect we can muster, and I am damn well
going to do that.”
And that is cool. Very cool.
The Grail
Brian
Doyle
208 pages,
softcover: $18.95.
Oregon State University Press, 2006.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline A quest for the world’s finest pinot noir.
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