Bouquet

G.B. Stern (1890-1973) was an author, playwright, and a critic whose literary circle included Noel Coward and Rebecca West. Her prose is brilliant, irresistible, hilarious and triumphal as she recounts her 1926 tour of the vineyards of France with her husband Johnny, and her friends Rosemary and Humphrey. Together they journey from Provence to the Rhône, across the Massif Central to Bordeaux, then up to the Loire Valley and across to Burgundy, finally completing a full circle in Avignon. They drink lavishly, eat voraciously, and with the requisite courteousness but an utterly addicting eye for the quirks and foibles of their hosts, they visit several of the greatest wineries of France (Chapoutier, Lafite-Rothschild, Margaux, Yquem, Romanée-Conti). Stern does not shy away from the occasional rant, and the one in which she addresses men’s sexism in regards to women and wine, is magnificent.

Bouquet is “a triumphal tour,” read the New York Times book review of July 10, 1927, “and Mrs. Stern has set it down with that happy sense of humor, that perfect eye for the ridiculous and that instinctive understanding of French character that lifts ‘Bouquet’ very far from the usual dry book about wine...”