Too intelligent and good to survive? 18 January 2008

Neuroscientist and winery owner Mark Solms recommends The World of Fine Wine

If you, or those who want to control your life, have ever asked why you squandered your education and earning potential on something as trivial as the world of fine wine, then The World of Fine Wine is the magazine for you! Neil Beckett (the magazine’s unassuming editor) kindly gave me a copy during a visit to South Africa. Since this is what people with something to sell normally do, I had no great expectations. The magazine looked and felt like one of those large, glossy, coffee-table titles – so much so that I no longer recall why I even opened it. But when I did, and saw the list of contents, which immediately prompted me to carefully read some of the articles, I realised that this magazine was something truly, madly, deeply special. That first impression has grown with every subsequent issue I have read. Could it be true that such an intelligent magazine actually exists in this day and age? I keep expecting the bubble to burst, but it hasn’t yet.

In addition to the usual reviews and ratings, with a special focus on rare and fine wine auctions, this magazine contains a plethora of unusual and unexpected articles by specialists from the oddest backgrounds (e.g., experimental archaeologists, aesthetic philosophers, cognitive information theorists – alongside the more typical wine types) who write about subjects so interesting that they sometimes threaten to reveal the very meaning of life. These authors seek to understand (I mean really understand) what distinguishes between a ‘very good wine with some outstanding features’ and a ‘wine of spellbinding beauty and resonance, leaving the drinker with a sense of wonder’. (These, incidentally, are two of their rating categories.) They write essays on terroir with no less seriousness than Einstein put into his general theory of relativity.

A recent issue reported on neuroscientific and philosophical studies of the ultimate foundations of vinous value judgements. The latest issue contains an article that reconstructs the first wines ever made, 8000 years ago, from chemical analyses of ancient pottery shards. Another article, by an historical archaeologist I think, convinced me that the transformation of grapes (a mere foodstuff) into wine (a work of art) is one of the foundations of human culture – of what distinguishes us from the apes.

And what about this little piece of sociological theory: ‘once wine is adopted, usually first by kings and the upper class, it eventually comes to dominate the economy, religion, and society as a whole’! And did you know that about 10 000 grape varieties still occur in the Middle East and across Europe, of which we currently utilise only a handful to produce all the world’s wine? Imagine the unexplored potential for new experiences in taste and aroma.

The World of Fine Wine confirms what you always knew somewhere in the inarticulate recesses of the part of your mind that determines what you do with your life: namely that fine wine really is important. Except now you can put that vague insight into words, and explain it impressively to the people who are dismayed by your supposedly inexplicable obsession.

This highly original magazine is lovingly put together by some original, kind, wise and good people. For that reason alone, in my experience, it cannot possibly survive. So if you want to read an almost-perfect quarterly before you die, subscribe quickly to this one. Sadly, it is not cheap; but how many fresh miracles do you expect to hear about all at once?

• Mark Solms is the owner of Solms-Delta in Franschhoek

DISCOUNT  SUBSCRIPTION OFFER

• During December 2007 the World of Fine Wine offered Grape readers a discounted subscription  to the magazine. This offer has now been extended for a few more weeks. Click here for details.