Grub Street £20 pp352

His college years excepted, Robert Parker has lived all his 58 years in a small patch of rural Maryland. He met his wife Pat when they were both 12, married barely 10 years later and, for more than three decades, they have lived in the house in which she was brought up, 10 minutes’ drive from Parker’s childhood home. He has worked from their house in the same job since 1984 and doesn’t appear, from this biography, to have a huge range of interests outside his all-consuming work, although he has at least one more passion than he had at the age of 18. At that stage, apparently, “he hadn’t shown passion for anything other than soccer and Pat”.

Looked at like that, Parker doesn’t seem promising biographical material — “a ribald sense of humour” and a collection of “tasteless Washington jokes” not withstanding. But that third passion, which he discovered when he was 20, changed the course of his life and, over time, the lives of millions of other people in America and way beyond. The seminal event was a trip to France (in pursuit of Pat, who was studying there). Arriving in Paris, he drank French wine for the first time. The food and culture were a revelation, too, but it was the wines he substituted for his usual Coca-Cola that really fired his imagination.

Since then — and Elin McCoy takes us step by step through college wine-tasting groups, the founding of his journal The Wine Advocate and his famous 100- point scoring system — Parker has become the most powerful wine critic in the world. Perhaps he is even more than that. Some people say he is the most powerful critic of any kind because none in any other field has a global influence. When Parker pronounces in The Wine Advocate on an individual wine or the wines of a region or those of a particular vintage, the world listens and markets respond. Prices move and wines sell — or not if they have displeased the mighty palate.

That one man should have such an impact on the international wine trade has caused unease even among producers whose wines regularly find favour, but Parker’s power extends further and with it the sense of unease. He has influenced the way wine styles have evolved in the last 25 years. Reds, in particular, have become bigger, richer, riper, softer and more alcoholic, including wines such as Bordeaux for which these used not to be the most prized attributes. Quality has improved at the same time and Parker can certainly take some of the credit, but it has been at the expense of a degree of diversity.

As McCoy points out, this is not all Parker’s doing. The trend for employing wine-making consultants plays its part. A tiny handful has become fashionable, bringing tried-and-tested formulas to scores of different properties. The problem, as Parker’s detractors see it, is that these formulas produce wines in the style that he rates highly. Thus, employing the right consultant can almost guarantee that your wine will be tasted by him — and, you hope, reviewed favourably, thereby as good as ensuring that it will sell well.

So, how does Parker react to his critics? In a word, badly. In two words, very badly. For one who in person comes across as so like-able, straightforward and unpompous, and who has spent a good part of his career dishing out criticism, Parker is extraordinarily sensitive to criticism himself. He doesn’t seem able to stand back and get it in proportion. When anyone has suggested that he likes only big, fruit-driven wines, questioned his 100-point scoring system or his ability to taste so many wines in one session, or wondered if he really understands burgundy, his frequent response has been to accuse the critic of being jealous of his success — and, of course, wrong. He has threatened legal action on other occasions and has been sued, most famously by the burgundy producer Faiveley. He is utterly certain about his abilities and has said that he “works harder” and has “been more reliable than anyone else”. McCoy says that “his conviction that his judgments were unassailable was abundantly clear” from the first issues of The Wine Advocate.

It would be in character for Parker to conclude that both the author and the present reviewer are jealous of his success. You decide; but don’t miss this book if you want to know what has influenced the wine world in the last 30 years — and why. At times it is repetitive and slightly disorganised, but I would still give it 88 on the 100-point Parker scale.

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