{"id":7517,"date":"2021-04-04T04:35:03","date_gmt":"2021-04-04T08:35:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wine365.com\/?p=7517"},"modified":"2021-04-13T09:38:29","modified_gmt":"2021-04-13T13:38:29","slug":"ray-isle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wine365.com\/stage\/ray-isle\/","title":{"rendered":"Ray Isle"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Sunday Spotlight <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Shedding some light on your favorite wine writers.<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Ray Isle<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRay Isle is the Executive Wine Editor of Food & Wine<\/em> and the Wine & Spirits Editor of Travel + Leisure<\/em>. He writes Food & Wine<\/em>\u2019s monthly \u201cBottle Service\u201d column and oversees wine content for both brands as well as contributing regular print and online features about wine, spirits, and wine-related travel. His articles about wine, beer, food, and spirits have appeared in a wide range of national publications, as well as in Best American Food Writing. He has twice won the IACP Award for Narrative Beverage Writing, has won a gold award from the North American Travel Journalists Association, and been nominated three time for the James Beard Award in beverage writing. He speaks regularly on wine at events and is a frequent guest on national media, appearing on programs such as NBC\u2019s Today show, CNBC\u2019s On the Money & Squawk Box, American Public Media\u2019s \u201cSplendid Table,\u201d and many others.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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1. What was your first job as a writer?<\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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My first job as a writer\u2014hm. I suppose the first thing I ever got paid for, in terms of writing, would have been a short story I sold to a literary magazine, well before I ever got into wine. I think I got paid something like $50 plus five free copies. If it\u2019s not clear, do not go into writing\u2014of any kind\u2014to make money. My first full-time job as a writer would have been when Josh Greene hired me at Wine & Spirits<\/em> magazine, in the early 2000s. He\u2019d read something I had written that was entirely unrelated to wine (an interview with the novelist Larry McMurtry), but saw in my bio that I was working for a wine importer in New York, and got in touch. So, thank you Josh!<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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2. What led you to becoming a wine writer?<\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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I was headed down an academic path; I had an M.A. in creative writing, then had gotten a Stegner Fellowship in fiction writing at Stanford. I assumed I\u2019d end up in a university, teaching, while trying to write novels. But I\u2019d gotten interested in wine, and the random chance that the fellowship I got put me in the Bay Area meant that I was close to wine country. I started visiting wineries, then started volunteering for weekend bottlings at a couple of small wineries (you got paid in wine; excellent thing on a grad student income), then flipped my teaching schedule around so I could work as a cellar rat\/intern during harvest for two years. Then I decided, the hell with\u00a0academia, I\u2019m switching to wine. Didn\u2019t necessarily know I\u2019d end up at a magazine, though.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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3. What kind of reader do you have in mind when you\u2019re writing?<\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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For Food & Wine,<\/em> someone who\u2019s interested in wine but is possibly just getting into it, or beginning to think they want to get more into it\u2014somewhat like I was before I started actually working in the business. We\u2019ve got a very large audience\u2014several million readers\u2014and while plenty of people in the wine biz read F&W (and thank you!), the vast majority are people who cook at home, love to go out to restaurants, and are excited when they open a bottle that turns out to be great. In a weird way, a lot of what I do seems to be demystifying the technical particulars of wine, while maintaining the overall mystery of the stuff.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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4. Where is the most magical place your wine writing has brought you?<\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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The Kingdom of Zod, where I am a wizard. Kidding. Most beautiful place, probably the Douro Valley. Most fascinating, possibly the country of Georgia. Most evocative, driving around in the mist in Piedmont in the early morning as it gradually blows off and reveals all those hillsides and vineyards and towns. Though driving along in the McLaren Vale in Australia and having a bunch of kangaroos bound along next to my car was pretty cool, too.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Read Ray’s article: A Wine Pilgrim’s Progress<\/p>

\"original-201205-a-napa-cabernet-pilgrimage.jpg\"<\/a><\/p>

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5. What was one of your favorite articles to write, and why? <\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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I\u2019ve always liked this personal essay I wrote for F&W, and since it\u2019s to some degree about how I got into wine\u2014or fell in love with wine, more accurately\u2014in the first place, it seems appropriate here.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Ray Isle<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Executive Wine Editor, Food & Wine Wine & Spirits Editor, Travel + Leisure<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Follow Ray on Social:<\/b><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\tTwitter<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/i>\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\tInstagram<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/i>\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\tMouse-pointer<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/i>\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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6. What is the best advice someone has given you on your writing? <\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Don\u2019t be afraid to write badly. Meaning: get a draft of the story written; you can always revise. Don\u2019t try to make it perfect from the start, because it\u2019s never going to be perfect anyway; \u201ca poem is never finished; it is only abandoned.\u201d Same for stories. Plus, with magazine journalism, even if your story is perfect, your editor is probably going to ask you to rewrite some of it. (And regarding that quote, often rewritten as \u201ca work of art is never finished, only abandoned,\u201d it\u2019s from the Symbolist poet Paul Val\u00e9ry, as paraphrased by W. H. Auden in 1965. Val\u00e9ry\u2019s original text reads, roughly, \u201cA work is never completed except by some accident such as weariness, satisfaction, the need to deliver, or death: for, in relation to who or what is making it, it can only be one stage in a series of inner transformations.\u201d <\/span>Next best advice for budding journalists: Wikipedia is not a source!)<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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7. What would you be doing if you weren\u2019t writing about wine?<\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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See above re: Kingdom of Zod. But, barring that, I hope I\u2019d still be writing, just not about wine. I had the happy good fortune of wanting to write for a living
and stumbling onto the thing I was apparently supposed to write about. I\u2019m sure there are others, though. And if I couldn\u2019t write? Hm. Maybe I\u2019d be a winemaker?<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Nominate someone for Sunday Spotlight:<\/p>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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