The Empire Builder

It all pours out in a new chronicle of wine's most influential critic

AT VARIOUS times in her new, unauthorized biography of Robert Parker, the world's most influential wine critic, author Elin McCoy rather sarcastically refers to him as "the great man." Her title, "The Emperor of Wine," suggests not only the power he wields but also the way in which it shapes his reality.

"Parker felt he had to keep his distance from producers whose wines he reviewed," she writes in a chapter titled The Emperor's Progress. "Friendship might be construed as a conflict of interest . . . he was boxed in by his role. It all seemed a little sad."

Any biographer brings certain opinions to the writing, but McCoy seems particularly conflicted about Parker, the man responsible for creating the 100-point rating system commonly used in reviewing and marketing wines around the country. When I asked her about him, she admitted to being "of two minds."

"There are two aspects to Parker;" she explained, "as a person, and as an icon — an emperor, if you will. Often emperors give very little thought to the actual effects of their power, and I think this is true of Parker. He never says he worries about it; he mostly denies that he has the power that he has."

Despite his rise to unparalleled prominence, which the book beautifully chronicles, Parker, says McCoy, stubbornly attempts to preserve his regular-guyness. He pads around his house in shorts and T-shirts, his constant companion a rather smelly bulldog (who passed away the same day as Julia Child). He listens endlessly to Neil Young records, tells raunchy jokes and makes a mean crab cake.

Though he is one of a handful of Americans (along with Ronald Reagan, Colin Powell, Neil Armstrong and Robert DeNiro) to have received the Legion of Honor, France's highest award, he is far from universally liked there. His popularity seems to rise and fall in direct proportion to the scores (and attendant sales) he bestows on its wines.

McCoy rightly pins his tipping-point turn of fortune to the debut of the 1982 Bordeaux vintage, which Parker trumpeted in his then-obscure newsletter, the Wine Advocate. "Fate smiled on me," she quotes him as saying, and she does a bang-up job explaining just how. The fallout from Parker's positive reviews of the vintage included the demise of his biggest competitor, Bob Finigan, who called it wrong.

Parker's career in wine also parallels the growth of the American industry. Despite his preference for French Bordeaux and Rhone reds, he has arguably done more than anyone to influence the flavors and styles of California wines. In one memorable chapter, McCoy rides with him as he visits Napa to pass judgment on its wines.

The book is chock full of such well-researched history, highlighted with gossipy intrigue. Parker has been subject to death threats, lawsuits and endless rumors about his health. In recent years he has lost several friends and his mother, and put on about 100 extra pounds.

"The years of eating great food and drinking two bottles of wine a day had also had their effect," McCoy writes. "Parker now weighed 265 pounds and had a distinct waddle as he stepped forward."

By book's end, McCoy almost seems to pity Parker the Emperor. Despite the wine world's chafing under his imperial sway, she writes, "Parker could take solace in the endless celebrations of his achievements — and global power."

Parker continues to be the lightning rod for the changes, both good and bad, in the industry. Most notably, his preference for awarding big scores to ripe, oaky, tannic, alcoholic wines has given rise to whole industries. Highly paid consultants travel the globe, helping wineries "Parkerize" their wines. Which leads McCoy to conclude that Parker has the kind of power that no other critic in any field has had.

Worse yet, she believes, that power has grown beyond his control.

"So much of what Parker says he stands for caused the opposite to happen," she says. "He argued for the democratization of wine, and yet became the very symbol of the elite expert pronouncing on unobtainable wines. Though he insisted he valued individual taste, the would-be consumer advocate became the supreme judge. He railed against high prices, but whenever he anointed a wine its price went up, and up, and up. His scoring system, intended as merely a quick assessment of quality, has encouraged the idea that only top-rated wines are worth drinking."

She takes particular aim at that system. It's a uniquely American method of assigning point values to what is, at best, a work of art. This Picasso, Parker is saying in effect, is a solid 88 points, but ah, this Van Gogh, now this is a perfect 100.

I have some minor quibbles with this book: Trivial details are left in ("he chops the onions because they bother Pat") while some longer stories (like the Faiveley lawsuit, a nasty affair that pitted Parker against one of the grand old families of Burgundy) are poorly organized. But McCoy shines in passages such as this, describing Parker's tasting methodology:

"As a wine went into his mouth, the first impression that popped into Parker's head was textural, then a picture, a photograph of the wine, almost in three dimensions he saw the wine in layers and textures, and in his mind he unpeeled them one by one."

For anyone with an interest in the way wine is made, sold, marketed, promoted and critiqued, "The Emperor of Wine" is a must-read.

Paul Gregutt writes the Wednesday wine column for The Seattle Times and teaches wine-tasting seminars. He can be reached at tastesmart@aol.com.