"A native of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, brought up on land which
has been in his family since before the American Revolution, James Norwood
Pratt was educated at Chapel Hill and abroad. He has been Honorary Director
of the first traditional Chinese teahouse in America, instrumental in
creating the American Premium Tea Institute and editor-in chief of Tea
Trade-the Magazine of the World Tea Business. He lives in San Francisco"
- - - New Tea Lover's Treasury
James Norwood Pratt
An exclusive interview by Tea Time World Wide
Norwood,
what are your favorite teas and why?
I can narrow it down to a few hundred--with effort. Actually, it depends. The spring brings fresh green teas like Dragon Well and first flush Darjeelings. Sometimes these can be miraculous, like this year's green Gopaldhara. With summer come oolongs from China, and later Taiwan, and second flush Darjeelings and black teas from everywhere, like the Golden Yunnan I enjoy for breakfast. Jasmines arrive in the fall, along with certain favorite Ceylons from the quality season....But then, it also depends on the weather or the mood one's in from one day to the next as to what is a favorite tea.
I understand you travel to Asia several times a year. What keeps bringing you back?
I'm a student of tea, and therefore of Asia. The civilization of the Orient is timeless and deep and tea is one thread which you can follow through it all, as widely as you wish to travel and as far back as you care to go. I suppose I'll never get enough of it, and God knows I love to convey my enthusiasm to select companions who come along to share the wonders. We go places Westerners have never been. It changes you. I'm hoping to lead a tour to South India next.
When did you first discover the magic of tea?
Like most people's, my beginnings were pretty humble. At university I learned a few of those sonorous tea names like Formosa oolong, Lapsang Souchong, Keemun...others. These were on the tins of a company called John Wagner & Sons to which I shall always be grateful. Only later did I learn to recognize the tastes the names stood for.
What are your favorite places to have tea in the world?
Lessee: the Sultan's Kiosk of the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul looking across the Bosphorus at Asia ops my list, even though Turkish tea tastes decidedly second rate when you drink it anywhere else. Brown's Hotel, London, and of course Pratt's Hotel in Bath. Mariage Freres in Paris is great to shop for tea but too fussy to enjoy tea there. I prefer Dallou, which overlooks the Jardins des Luxembourg, or that quaint left bank salon de the in the Cours de Rohan. And oh yes, a special favorite is Florians in Venice and another is Babbington's in Rome, right at the foot of the Spanish Steps across from the house where poor Keats died. The service is slow and the scones are burned but you're in Rome, and just about the only place there where they know what tea IS! Don't get me started on the US---or China!
What kinds of books do you enjoy for pleasure? What authors do you admire most?
I read mainly non-fiction: biographies, history both European and Asian, Buddhist studies, poetry. I try to keep my Latin up so I'm always struggling to re-read the classics I was taught in school, Catullus and Virgil and Horace mainly. And poetry. I love T.S.Eliot, Robinson Jeffers, Rilke, Thom Gunn, Gary Snyder, Phillip Whalen...a long list all told.
What other interests do you have besides tea?
Well, once you've been schooled in classics and comparative literature, as I was, you can't help spending the rest of your life studying these. I always have a work on the ancient world by my bedside for instance. Art history, especially the Italian Renaissance. I'm also quite serious about esoteric studies, which has bridged quite naturally into Tibetan Buddhism and Zen and Taoism for me. Besides reading (and writing) and travel and movies, I suppose my principal interest is in my friends. And sculpture and porcelain and and and
What advice would you give to a tea lover wanting to become a tea expert?
Forget about it! You can only be an expert on the teas that have already been made--last year's. Nothing can prepare you for the surprise of the NEW. Not a single tea man I showed that extraordinary Gopaldhara Darjeeling to was able to say even what country it came from just from the appearance. Any one who truly loves tea will become increasing expert as time goes by and experience piles up, but the pleasure is in the love, not the expertise. And besides, nobody can approach the expertise professional tasters acquire.
I know you thoroughly enjoy the Asian ceremonies of tea. Do you enjoy English tea and Victorian teas as well?
Absolutely. Every day between 4 and 5 pm! Milk in first too!
Most people who have sharp senses are also either gourmet cooks or thoroughly enjoy gourmet food. Are you one or the other or both. What kinds of foods do you enjoy?
I once counted up about 15 different ethnic restaurants within a 20 block radius of my home. That's not counting the sub-categories within each either. Here Italian means Venetian, Florentine, Lucchese, Ligurian, Sicilian, Triestino....you get the idea. I love em all! My only regret, food-wise, is that there's no place I know in the US to enjoy Turkish cusine, which I was surprised to find rivals the finest French and Chinese.
What characteristics do you most admire in other people?
I guess the most important quality of all is kindness--period. Besides kindness, I value sympathetic understanding, empathy maybe it's called, and also imagination in people. And the play of the mind. I can respect intellectual "work" but I what I ENJOY is somebody whose mind is always at play. I guess that's imagination, partly. Curiosity is important too.
What is your definition of "The Way"?
I like best all the non-definitions. Lao-tse says "The Way that can be named is not the Way." An aged Zen master, asked what Zen is, answered "Just one mistake after another." At midnight mass on Christmas Eve our bishop always begins his sermon by saying "Come all ye faithful....and come all ye unfaithful too!"
Since I launched Tea Time World Wide I have come across a few people who ask what I do for a living and can't imagine my career is writing and talking to people about tea. Have you ever come across anyone like that? How do you react to it?
Yes, the commonest response is "You mean tea, like you drink?" It takes a moment for them to realize that is precisely what I mean. Half the time they go on to say they enjoy Orange Pekoe and I say I do too and that's that. The other half of the time is unpredictable--people are curious to know what there is to say about tea, and so forth. Few Americans guess that tea, like wine, is a whole world you can enter and explore endlessly. It's better to provoke curiosity than to provide information to begin with.
When you give tea talks around the country what aspect of tea are people most fascinated by?
Well, my audiences and specific topics vary so wildly there's
no one answer. For instance, this autumn in my native state I shall give
an address on the history of tea cultivation in the Carolinas. The questions
that audience will ask will probably never be repeated anywhere else!
There is a subject everybody seems curious about whenever and wherever
it DOES come up and that is reading tea leaves. Of course it does work--to
varying degrees and not always--but beyond that I just tell folks to go
to my website and buy the bloody book I did on the subject!
Editors Notes
After meeting James Norwood Pratt this past summer I realized there was
more to the man than I had summized from his books. I was left with a
curiosity to know more about who he was as a person. Therefore I requested
and exclusive interview with him to share with my subscribers which he
graciously accepted. I hope you have enjoyed the results as much as I
have.
For those who would like to meet James Norwood Pratt in person Tea Time
World Wide will be planning special events in Massachusetts in the Fall/2002.
Sign Up Now for
our FREE quarterly newsletter and you will be kept updated about these
events as plans develop.
Browse, not Pinkies
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An Exlusive Interview
"The Art of Tea" Chapter #1
Pilgrimage to the Holy Land of Tea
