Robert M. Parker, Jr.
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Robert M. Parker, Jr. (born July 23, 1947) is an influential wine critic from the United States.
Parker was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He is an honors graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park, with a major in History, and a minor in Art History. He continued his education at University of Maryland, Baltimore, graduating in 1973 with a law degree. For over ten years he was an attorney for the Farm Credit Banks of Baltimore; he resigned in March 1984 to devote full attention to writing about wine.
By 1975, he began to think about writing about wine and starting an independent, consumer's guide. At that time, few wine writers or reviewers were not involved in the wine trade, and Parker felt their opinions were compromised by conflicts of interest. Parker wanted to be a consumer advocate, unencumbered by the need to sell wine.
By 1978, Parker had started The Wine Advocate; its first issue was complimentary, sent to those on mailing lists purchased from several major wine retailers. The magazine had 600 charter subscribers in August 1978.
Parker received worldwide attention when he "called" the 1982 vintage in Bordeaux as superb, contrary to the opinions of many other critics who felt it was too low-acid and ripe. The debate about whether 1982 is a vintage for the ages continues through the early 2000s, but the wine market appears to have spoken, elevating prices for 1982 Bordeaux above other vintages from the period.
Now, over twenty years later, The Wine Advocate has over 40,000 subscribers, in every state in the United States, and in over 37 foreign countries. Today, many knowledgeable observers agrees that The Wine Advocate exerts the most significant influence on the serious wine consumer's buying habits and trends not only in America, but in France, England, Switzerland, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Russia, Mexico, Brazil, and China.
In addition to doing the writing and tasting for The Wine Advocate, which is published bi-monthly in Parkton, Maryland, Mr. Parker has been a contributing editor for Food and Wine Magazine. He has also written periodically for the English magazine The Field and has been the wine critic for France's L'Express magazine, the first time a non-Frenchman has held this position.
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Books
Parker has written eleven books on wine that have been best sellers not only in the United States, but also in their translated versions in France, Japan, Germany, Sweden and Russia.
In November, 1985 his first book Bordeaux was published by Simon and Schuster. Bordeaux went into six printings, was a selection of the Book of the Month Club, and received international critical acclaim. An English edition of Bordeaux was published by the London firm of Dorling, Kindersely, Ltd. It won the prestigious Glenfiddich Award as England's top wine book of 1986. The Paris-based firm of Solar published Bordeaux in France in 1989, where the book promptly was reprinted three times. Moreover, France's Book of the Month Club, the largest in the world, made Bordeaux its "selection of the month" in January, 1991. Foreign language editions of Bordeaux have been published in Japan, Germany, and Sweden.
In 1987, Simon and Schuster published two more wine books by Mr. Parker, Parker's Wine Buyer's Guide and The Wines of the Rhône Valley and Provence. The latter book won the Tastemaker's Award in 1989 as the top wine book of the year published in America and The Wine Guild's Wine Book of the Year Award in The United Kingdom.
In April, 1989, his second Wine Buyer's Guide was published, and his fifth book, Burgundy, was published in 1990. Burgundy was also published in both France and England in 1991. In the fall of 1991, a revised and greatly expanded edition of Bordeaux was published. It has appeared in Japanese, German, and French editions. In 1992, it was the winner of the IACP Award (International Association of Cooking Professionals) as the top wine book of the year. Also in 1992, Maryland's Loyola College recognized Mr. Parker as the "Marylander of the Year."
In 1993, the third edition of Parker's Wine Buyer's Guide was published. The German language edition of Bordeaux won that country's top prize for books on wine and gastronomy, the "Goldene Feder." In France, the 1994 French language edition of Bordeaux spent three months on France's "Best Seller" list. In 1997/1998, Le Guide Parker (the French language edition of his buyer's guide) spent 27 weeks on France's top ten list of books.
In 1995, Parker published the fourth edition of Parker's Wine Buyer's Guide, a book that received huge commercial and critical success. It was republished in England and France, where it is called The Guide Parker. In 1997, his ninth book, The Wines of the Rhone Valley, was published in English and French. In 1998, his tenth book, the 3rd edition of Bordeaux, was published in Germany, England, France, Japan and the United States.
Awards and recognition
Parker has been profiled in many magazines and newspapers in the U.S., Britain and France.
In 1993, Parker received the Wine and Vine Communication Award from Moet-Hennessey for his French language editions of Bordeaux and Burgundy. In 1995, Parker was made the third honorary citizen of the Rhone Valley's most important wine village, Chateauneuf du Pape, the other two recipients of this honor being Frederic Mistral and Marcel Pagnol.
In May, 1998, Robert Parker was awarded top honors by the James Beard Foundation (which awards the highest honors to food and beverage professionals) for the "Wine and Spirits Professional of 1997."
On March 29, 1999, French President Jacques Chirac signed a decree authorizing Parker to be a Chevalier dans l'Ordre de la Légion d'honneur. He was decorated at a ceremony at the Elysee Palace on June 22, 1999. President Chirac said "Robert Parker is the most followed and influential critic of French wines in the world, something I (President Chirac) witnessed recently when choosing wine for President Clinton, who automatically referred to Robert Parker as his reference for making a proper wine buying decision." In 1993, the late President François Mitterrand made Robert Parker a Chevalier dans l'Ordre National du Merite. The Légion d'honneur was created by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1802 to honor the highest level of achievement to France. Robert Parker is one of only a handful of foreigners to have received France's two highest Presidential honors.
Impact on the wine industry
With a circulation that is roughly one tenth that of Wine Spectator, it seems unlikely that Parker could be such a powerful critic. However, many wine stores rely on him to provide tasting notes and scores for the wines they sell. A Parker score of 90, roughly equivalent to an "A" in the U.S. school system, means that he judges it to be high quality wine. This score is often sufficient to induce customers to buy without having tasted the wine, although Parker himself cautions that they should read the tasting notes to determine the wine is made in a style they will like. As he was quoted in a February 2005 article:
- There can never be any substitute for your own palate nor any better education than tasting the wine yourself.... Any scoring system ... ultimately makes the taster more accountable to the reader. I am comfortable with my point system and I recognise its limitations: there is nothing scientific about it, and it should not be interpreted that way.
Even the famed "first growths" of Bordeaux are not immune to Parker's scoring. With great reviews for the 2000 vintage, many raised their prices to unheard of levels. When Parker declined to review the 2002 vintage in barrel, they were forced to drop their prices to previous levels.
Perhaps most controversial is Parker's impact on the style of fine wines. Parker argues that he scores wines on how much pleasure they give him. His critics claim that he likes less-acidic, riper wines with huge amounts of oak, alcohol, and extract that are unsubtle. In order to sell their wines for higher prices, some wineries choose to change their vineyard or winery practices to make wines in the style Parker prefers. Indeed, certain low-producting "boutique" wineries have enjoyed great success catering to his tastes.
External links
- The Wine Advocate (http://www.erobertparker.com/)
- Hedonistic Fruit Bombs (http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n03/shap01_.html), a February 2005 article in London Review of Books, with biographical informationja:ロバート・パーカー