A Wine Story—with Puns Intended

My friends used to marvel at how I managed to find the time to read so much—meaning actual literature, current events, and reports on culture that might make me vaguely interesting at a dinner party. But this is no longer the case.

I fear I have become rather one-dimensional. These days, it seems that all I do is read about wine, either in the blogosphere or in some vintage guide, wine magazine, or other monolithic text on the subject.

Recently I vowed to balance my vinous readings with something that might at least bring my vocabulary back to the center, and I have found just the thing. Been Doon So Long: A Randall Grahm Vinthology is a collection of satirical essays, poems, illustrations and graphics written and (in the case of the visuals) collaborated on by Randall Grahm, California winemaker, iconoclast, and founder of Bonny Doon Vineyard.

Using hilarious, often pun-laden parodies of diverse literary works, the book chronicles Grahm’s evolution from Pinot Noir worshipping University of California-Davis enology student to his more recent yet equally obsessive resolution to produce true, terroir-driven wines—wines that speak of a place, somewhere in California.

Grahm is a great writer and a deep thinker. In brilliant narratives peppered with technical wine jargon, philosophical abstractions, endless footnotes, cosmic references, and even Yiddish, he lampoons himself, the industry, wine snobs, wine critics, and wine geeks alike.

This is a book that not only satisfies my craving for wine minutia but refreshes my literary memory while awakening the visual senses.

Tags: wine