Labor of Love: When Women and Wine Embrace June 9, 2016Elisa PesceLast Thursday was no ordinary day. Of course, as every year, on June 2 Italy celebrated the Republic Day. But this year there was another important event taking place on this date in the world of wine: at Ca’ del Baio, in the beautiful scenario of Treiso vineyards and under a light rain, American writer Suzanne Hoffman presented her new book, a loving tribute to the wine families of Piemonte where women played and still play a major role in preserving traditions while fostering innovation in the name of their love for the hard work called winemaking.Perhaps it was no coincidence that the book launch took place on that day as Suzanne’s “Labor of Love” is more than a simple book about wine. In fact, it’s completely different from any previous work of its kind. Passion, respect and admiration shine through each and every one of the stories and portraits in the book, in the same way as Suzanne could barely control her emotion while sharing with her audience the most touching encounters and the individual life stories that urged her to write the book. To the 22 wine families in the book and to all her readers, she asked never to forget these examples of true Piemontese life and values, and to pass down this prized legacy to the future generations, to people in Italy and worldwide, because they are part of the history and culture of this beautiful region.Maurizio Rosso, who introduced the author to the public at Ca’ del Baio, chose this passage from the first chapter of the book to recreate the atmosphere that accompanied Suzanne and her husband during their “16 years of research and friendship” in the hills of Langhe, Roero and Monferrato:“It was springtime, a delightful season in the hills of Barbaresco, although true Piemontephiles like me find any season in the gastronomically rich region inviting, no matter how cold or gray. The vineyards were awakening after their long winter slumber and the sun chased away the foggy mornings. Coming from Switzerland, where it was still winter, my husband, Dani, and I needed sunshine.”And they found it, not much in the rigid Piemonte climate, but in the smiles and generosity of the people they met there, who confided to her family stories since then mostly untold, intertwined with historical events such as World War II, the German occupation and the post-war political instability. Suzanne launched a successful project on Kickstarter in April to raise funds for the printing of “Labor of Love” and decided to publish independently, in order to have the book ready as soon as possible. In fact, many of the people who inspired her and that she interviewed are very old: to procrastinate would have meant some of them would probably have not been there anymore for the book launch.There are so many things I could say about this wonderful book and the stories it tells, but nothing will ever be like reading it first-hand. So please do, possibly, as Suzanne suggested to me signing my copy of the book, “savour the pleasures of the written word enjoying a glass of Piemontese wine!“*****If you want to know more about Suzanne Hoffman and her dedication to the world of wine, you can visit her website www.winefamilies.com or read this interview on WinePass.Altri articoli che potrebbero interessarti:Elisa Pesce

BOOK REVIEW: SUZANNE HOFFMAN’S LABOR OF LOVE

“Wine is a memory of a place. Wine is the memory of the grass, the bacteria, the insects, the memory of what happened millions of years ago, the memory of the people who worked there and are no longer here.”

–Winemaker Gaia Gaja, on the importance of viticulture and being connected to the land.

Suzanne Hoffman’s Labor of Love is an ambitious undertaking, representing the results of more than a decade invested in getting to know the families of significant Piemontese winemakers. She offers a fascinating and engaging focus on the women behind those families, women who uniformly serve as the strength, direction, and irrepressible determination behind some of the best wines being made anywhere. The book opens making no secret about its rather noble mission–getting the reader to not only become familiar the Wine Family Women of Piemonte, but to feel admiringly connected to them.

It is no endeavor to be idly embarked upon; the average wine consumer knows Italy at best for the Chianti that sometimes bears the mark of the black rooster. The above-average wine consumer has maybe heard of Barolo (but perhaps doesn’t know that name refers to a town and a DOCG denomination, not a grape) and knows it as the expensive wine gathering dust on a shelf at the better wine stores around town, but probably still can’t name other Piemontese varietals, let alone the vintners who produce them or the names of the sub-regions in Piemonte. The really dedicated Italian wine fan can list along with Barolo the Dolcettos, Barbarescos, Barberas, Arneis, Nascetta, etc also found in Piemonte, but probably still feels no psychological connection to the rolling hills just south of the Alps in northwestern Italy. For all its weight in the wine world, Piemonte just does not get the tourist traffic that the Rome/Florence/Venice track gets, or anywhere near it. It is without a doubt the key wine region in Italy any connoisseur will want to know, but it rarely hits the radar of the average first or second or third-time visitor to Italy.

How best to bridge that gap? How best to have the non-Italian reader feeling engrossed in the inner workings of Italian wine families in a decidedly quiet, bucolic, off the beaten path corner of the peninsula?

Hoffman goes about it in possibly the best way–writing eloquently to put you in the kitchens, tasting rooms, neatly trained rows of Nebbiolo and Dolcetto and Barbera, and most notably in the warm hearts of the women who make the Piemonte wine scene possible. The beautifully bound, substantial tome is lovingly laid out with extensive use of excellent photography that plants the reader right there in the vineyard; after an introductory chapter that lays bare why there might not be a Piemonte DOCG today were it not for the selfless labors of Giulia Falletti (the ‘patron saint’ of Piemonte wine women) you spend each of the twenty two chapters reading the fruits of a decade and a half of considerate investigatory labor, taking in a thorough examination of the history of the vineyard, a description of the family structure behind it, and the role that the women in the family have played over the past couple centuries. You begin to understand how, through the trials and travails of two world wars, depressions, phylloxera epidemics, occupations, the Industrial Revolution, mass production of cheap jug wines, and proliferation of modern technologies, it has always been the inner strength of these amazingly resourceful women providing the psychic glue Piemonte’s wine families needed.

In short, when tilting a glass of Nebbiolo or Arneis, you are touching the essence of truly locavorist artisanal culture that would not prevail today were it not for the tireless and often thankless labors of women in a culture that frankly still often fails to see women as equals politically and socially.

This is not to say that Labor of Love is a merely sentimental hagiography of women in Piemonte; it is rather an honest, thoroughly researched, and warmly offered recounting of stories that are quite often rather tragic. The reader will note many common themes throughout, perhaps chief among them perseverance through tragedy. All but universally these women have had to carry on through brutal occupations by Nazis, and past deaths of sons and husbands and daughters, through hunger and starvation and loss of crops, and often while not knowing if they would even be able to inherit the very land they were tilling with calloused hands in the fields.

Reading the stories gives you an emotional connection to women who themselves live and embody an undeniably heartfelt connection to the land that sustains them, and to their forebears. They express repeatedly the redemptive qualities of working the land, and being invested in it for a lifetime, and you come to understand it more deeply than you thought possible.

Another common theme is charity, whether it was risking their lives in World War Two to feed Italian partisans fighting the Nazis and the Fascists, or whether it was helping neighbors keep their crops alive. It is quite clear by the book’s end how deeply held the sense of community is for the wine women of Piemonte. In sum, their experience is a microcosm of the Italian experience in the last 150 years generally, what with the changing role of women in society and the changing sense of self-awareness of the Italians themselves as it morphed over the last century and a half from a loosely affiliated collection of regions and city-states into parts of a larger, Italian whole; the challenges these women have overcome parallel the ones the entire peninsula has endured, and the future they worry about collectively is in many ways the same set of challenges Italy will struggle with in the 21st Century, namely how to preserve a sense of “Italianess” in an increasingly globalized economy wherein Italy is not quite sure of its place.

Labor of Love will inevitably have you looking at your calendar wondering when you can next jump a plane to Italy to start exploring; you will certainly close the book not only wanting to explore the wine they make, but get to know the women whose hearts and minds the book has offered tantalizing insights into.

Wine is culture, wine is indeed civilization. It is a liquid connection to the very earth from whence all of us came, and it is the very expression of the earth that feeds all of us. To truly know a culture is to taste its food and wine, and learn about the people who bring it to us. This book is a great way to begin that journey, and be forewarned–you won’t be able to read it without feeling a tremendous urge to get to Piemonte.

I’ve read dozens of wine books over the past few decades. Most of these works are meant as reference guides, filled with facts and figures about vineyards, cellars, grape types and other such data. A few have been exceptional, but all have added to my education regarding wines from around the world.

Now though, a new book has come along that is just as valuable as those others, but instead of information on clones or how vineyards are planted, the focus of this book is on people, specifically women in the region of Piemonte, in Italy’s northwest. The book, Labor of Love: Wine Family Women of Piemonte, authored by Suzanne Hoffman, is not only a well-written, fascinating journey into this region’s history over the past hundred years or so, it’s also an engaging work that is quite refreshing, as it gives us a look at the individuals that make wine.

Hoffman, an attorney by trade, has been traveling to Piemonte with her husband for many years and slowly but surely, thanks in large part to the friendship of a Barbaresco producer, has been introduced to several local winemaking families. She tells the story of multiple generations of these families, with the focus on the women. One of the principal tenets of this book is that these women now have more visible duties as far as winemaking, sales and marketing, but the author points out that the women that made these wineries great along with their husbands, uncles and sons, had tremendous responsibilities in the past as well. Perhaps they weren’t doing any cellar work, but their behind the scenes labors were just as important some forty, fifty and seventy years ago.

A great example of how important women were to these firms can be found in the chapter on Cascina delle Rose, a small, traditional producer of stellar quality in Barbaresco. The current owner is Giovanna Rizzolio, an opinionated woman of fierce convictions (Hoffman labels her as “gregarious.”). In the family history that the author explores, it is Giovanna’s grandmother Beatrice Rizzolio that emerges as a strong influence, not only with her immediate family, but also with the community, as she would do others favors, such as lending money. As Hoffman points out, Beatrice did this with not with a written contract, but merely with “a handshake and meeting of eyes.” That was sufficient for Beatrice.

But there is more to this woman that simple favors for locals. Hoffman details her activities from 1943 to 1945, when the German army settled in the area. Beatrice stood up to these invaders, at one point putting herself in bodily harm, in order to protect a group of teenage boys. Stories such as these help give the reader insight into Beatrice and other strong women of Piemonte, which in turn help us understand the moral fiber of these people. Is it any wonder then why the local wines are so distinctive?

There are numerous stories of how local women stayed strong, as their decisions were needed. An example of this can be found in the chapter on the Poderi Oddero estate of Santa Maria, below the town of La Morra. The author notes that the Mariacristina Oddero, who learned about winemaking and terroir from her father as well as in her studies in Alba (she has a degree in vineyard management and taught classes on soil chemistry for several years), had to confront her uncle Luigi about the direction the winery would take – would it be bulk wine or improved quality through stricter work? The story is a fascinating one.

Hoffman writes about 22 wineries in Piemonte, ranging from famous Barolo producers , such as Giuseppe Rinaldi and Elio Altare, to lesser-known, but equally quality-minded firms such as Monchiero Carbone and Deltetto, both located in the Roero district. She has done a remarkable amount of research for this book, with most of it being sit-down interviews with the current generation of women, who took the time to narrate their family’s history to Hoffman. One telling remark comes from Gaia Gaja, daughter of Angelo Gaja, one of Piemonte’s and the world’s most famous vintners. The younger Gaja tells Hoffman that there is not a competition between fathers and daughters, as there might be with fathers and sons. “It is about open love, sharing knowledge and passing it on to the next generation,” she remarks.

There are more than two hundred, full-color photos in the book, along with a few dozen vintage black and white images. The photos are excellent and how gracious of the author to take the space at the end of the book to credit the local photographers.

All in all, here is a book that was written by an outsider, an outsider in name only. After reading Labor of Love: Wine Family Women of Piemonte, you would swear that Suzanne Hoffman is someone that has been living in Piemonte for years. In reality then, she has become an insider. All of us who love the wines of Piemonte should read this book, if only to understand that these singular wines are great not only because of decades of work in the vineyards, but also the determination of these people as they present wines that represent their traditions, their heritage and their anima – their soul.

Labor of Love: Wine Family Women of Piemonte / USD $55 / Euro 50

For further information or to order, please send an email to Suzanne Hoffman at:

suzanne@winefamilies.com

PUBLISHED BY
tom hyland
I am a freelance wine writer and photographer specializing in the wines of Italy. I live in Chicago and recently completed my 65th trip to Italy. I have visited virtually every region in the country and am constantly amazed at the wonderful variety of wines produced from indigenous grapes (I am never amazed at the quality of the wines!). I have been in the wine business for 35 years, have been writing for 17 years and have been a professional photographer for the past eight years. I currently contribute to publications such as Decanter and wine-searcher.com. I am a freelance photographer for Cephas Picture Library in England and have had my photos published in the publications above plus several more.