Frankly nasty, never happy

Posted on | December 13, 2005

In the middle of an avalanche of emails and positive telephone calls, some people and I pity them in as much as I imagine them unhappy, spit out their venom on the Walden project (see HERE). I was expecting it, of course, but the violence and the views taken by some really surprised me. An example? An email, anonymous of course, or believing such, they used the contact sheet on the Walden site to let himself loose. Thus:

"Mr swindler Bizeul gives himself a good conscious, delighted to see that a man who would spit on the public and sell his cuvèes at prohibitive prices (200 to do ‘as the Bordelais’ sic) gives himself a good conscience by trying to appear fair-minded."

More, always anonymous, but with more arguments « Guillaume » criticises the supermarkets who, for him, don’t take enough margin in distributing Walden (a mistake, as usual, it’s the contrary)  and accuses me in so many words of being responsible or at least actively participating in the disappearance of the small shopkeeper in town centres. Re-typing his diatribe doesn’t appeal, you can read it here and there as he has exerted himself in spreading his bile a bit everywhere. You can also avoid it, in as much as common place and sophistic arguments may depress you.

Reply? To what? It’s not a debate, there’s no discussion possible, it’s only a molotov cocktail of hate and jealousy. And to whom, since from every point of view, « Guillaume » is warm behind his cosy anonymity? Whatever my response, some would always find something to criticise whatever I said: "I make expensive wines, I’m a nonentity. I make them cheap, even more of a nonentity. I make a margin, I’m a profiteer. I don’t make, smacks of robbery. I don’t let them taste them, I’m stingy. I do make them taste them, I’m a bluffer. I make wines that are too concentrated, too much so. I look for finesse, for some, not enough for their money. I make wines of the south, they lack freshness. If I augment this freshness, I am no longer representative of « my terroir ». I help my friends, my colleagues, to call attention to myself. I don’t help, I am a horrible profiteer…. It’s without end…

Instead of passing lots of time criticising, what do amateurs do to help others drink better? The most often, nothing, everyone occupied rending themselves apart on the various forums, like wild animals fighting over a carcass, perpetuating in permanence the image of wine in general and particularly French wine. In return, to criticse my initiative, without even, of course, ever having tasted Walden, they surpass themselves. I believe it is only in France one sees this kind of behaviour. For me it is very sad, but that won’t stop it happening. The point: not all viticulturists dream of making wine, nor do all stock rearers think themselves butchers, nor all cereal growers, bakers.

In the middle of this article to read the last book of Amèlie Nothomb, a phrase summoned me. Ouf, I didn’t throw it away: "In the end, Creation accomplished, what was the task of God? No doubt that of a writer when his book is published: to openly love his work, receive compliments, gibes, indifference. Confront some readers who denounce the fault of the work and even if they are right, one is powerless to change it. To love it ’til the end."

I leave you to change « writer  » with « vigneron »

And thus, I sign off!

Hervè Bizeul

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