Tuscan Character.
“I answer frank speech with frank words.”
The winter was serious, the stinging cold and hoarfrost making us want to stay indoors.
Spring was rainy and the weather continued wet and cold through April and May until the sun regained its courage in June.
July and August were challenging, hotter than usual and extremely dry. This makes the vines suffer and affects the ripening of the grapes; 2009 was a great test of their fortitude.
The first three weeks of September were even hotter and drier but right at the end conditions improved, with gentle rain and pleasant coolness producing beautiful balance.
2009 was a real test of Tuscan character and discipline in the vineyards. As our fellow Tuscan Leonardo da Vinci wrote, “Every obstacle is destroyed by discipline”.
2009, The Tuscan character
We close with the lines of the Tuscan poet Giosuè Carducci, who won the Nobel Prize for literature on 10th October 1906.
La nebbia agli irti colli The mist rises drizzly
piovigginando sale, to the rugged hills,
e sotto il maestrale and under the north-west wind
urla e biancheggia il mar; the sea roars white;
ma per le vie del borgo but in the town streets,
dal ribollir de’ tini from the bubbling vats,
va l’aspro odor dei vini the sharp aroma of wine
l’anime a rallegrar. rises to cheer the soul.
Gira su’ ceppi accessi Over the burning logs turns
lo spiedo scoppiettando: the crackling spit:
sta il cacciator fischiando the hunter stands whistling
sul l’uscio a rimirar at the door to gaze,
tra le rossastre nubi among the reddish clouds,
stormi d’uccelli neri, at flocks of black birds,
com’esuli pensier, like wandering thoughts,
nel vespro migrar. flying in the dusk.