Book Description
Michael Dibdin’s first non-fiction book is a story of wine making, wine-makers, the families and feuds that have characterised the business, the science of grape types and cultivation, and the search for vintage growths. But it specifically tells the remarkable tale of one Itailan grape variety, popular in Roman times for its rich, full wine and for the wine’s longevity in the bottle, but long though to have been extinct: the Osar. The Osar is not a bountiful grape; the vine does not yield a big harvest. By the twentieth century it had fallen from fashion as other more easily cultivated grapes took precedence. These, though, could not match its fruitiness or fullness. But one North Italian family searched for and found the last remaining vines of the Osar – four only. Over a period of years, and often imperilled by natural and man-made disasters, they propagated the Osar until in 1995 for the first time there was enough to produce a few bottles. It remains a rare and exclusive vintage. But it thrives: a wine of classic pedigree. And in Michael Dibdin’s hands it becomes a restorative tale of natural rediscovery .
