By David Daniel

There was, after all, something Faustian in the prospect of an elixir that promised to reveal glimpses of the divine while simultaneously burning pits of fire in the seeker’s brain.

The Absinthe Forger: A True Story of Deception, Betrayal, and the World’s Most Dangerous Spirit by Evan Rail. Melville House 2024. 320 pages. $32.

Across the millennia of human consumption of alcohol no beverage accrued a greater mystique than absinthe. It conjures up the sybaritic bohemian culture of la Belle Époque, with its images of the Moulin Rouge and high-kicking cancan dancers. Notable writers and artists — Baudelaire, Modigliani, Picasso, Rimbaud, Strindberg, Wilde, Toulouse-Lautrec, and van Gogh among them — celebrated absinthe as a muse. For boulevardiers, imbibing the drink became a social ritual: an English magazine of the time reported that “Parisian café life is most animated in the afternoon between five and seven, l’heure verte, the ‘green hour’ when people are wont to drink absinthe, reading the evening papers, and gossip with their friends.”

It was likely with this dissolute reputation in mind that, in 2007, out for dinner with friends at a trending restaurant in Somerville, I spied an unfamiliar bottle on the back bar. I had heard stories about absinthe and I was predisposed to try it. The flavor (and the fact that it immediately clouded when water was introduced) reminded me of ouzo. There was a pleasant anise scent, but the taste was stronger, with a bitter edge. As for anything more … dream-like? I didn’t experience it. And yet, what about all those tales about absinthe’s mind-altering effects?

Medicinal use of wormwood, the liquor’s signature ingredient, extends from ancient times, but what we call absinthe was a product of the late 18th century, concocted in Switzerland by a French physician and offered as a patent remedy. It begins with a base — often straight grain or grape alcohol — to which is added a blend of some dozens of culinary and floral ingredients. The fusion formulas are proprietary, depending on the particular distiller, but three key ingredients are required in the mix. The holy trinity are anise, fennel, and artemisia absinthium, or grand wormwood, a bitter herb notorious for both its health benefits and its supposed psychoactive properties.

Known as la Fée Verte (the Green Fairy) because of its tint, absinthe became the subject of legend, generated by the notion that it produced mind-altering effects (along with the ominous idea that it could drive the drinker to madness). Not a sweetened liqueur like ouzo or sambuca, absinthe is an over-proof spirit. In its early days it was often 72 percent ABV (alcohol by volume) or 144 proof; by comparison, whiskey is generally 40-50 percent ABV (80-100 proof). Absinthe’s power became the stuff of legend. Drinkers were often depicted as debauchees. By the start of World War I, the attendant mythology — as well as the perceived public health threat of drinking absinthe — were sufficient to see its manufacture and distribution banned in most countries, a prohibition that lasted nearly a century before it was lifted.

Author Evan Rail, who writes about food and drink for the New York Times and Condé Nast Traveler, confesses to becoming “absolutely obsessed” with the history and culture of absinthe. He discovered a small international underground of absintheurs fascinated by how it was made and consumed. Semi-secret, networking via social media, they take deep dives into its rituals and lore, collecting the various accoutrements of the spirit, from old labels and advertisements to glassware and antique alembics. Of special fascination: locating absinthe bottled before the prohibition took effect — so-called “pre-ban” absinthe — which was put up for sale on the sites, allegedly having been discovered in dusty wine cellars whose precise locations were never revealed.

In 2018, researching for a book on absinthe, Rail found his journalistic senses tingling when vague reports circulated on the network that an unknown person was creating and selling counterfeit bottles of pre-ban absinthe. If true, and there was fraud afoot, the entire absinthe fraternity would be endangered. Its members depended on mutual trust. The Absinthe Forger is, in part, an account of how a group of members set out to catch the “forger.”

Oscar Wilde: “A glass of absinthe is as poetical as anything in the world. What difference is there between a glass of absinthe, and a sunset?”

Rail’s pursuit of the story takes him across the UK, Switzerland, France, Germany, and the Czech Republic, doing detective work in places like Val-de-Travers in Switzerland and Pontarlier, France. Authentic bottles of pre-ban absinthe (from before 1916) exist, but they are very rare. Cobwebbed with time — dusty labels, old corks, and wax seals — they are prized, both to own and to drink. And Rail got to taste some in his travels.

It was a quest often frustrated by a close-knit community resistance to outsiders — and by an elusive quarry who went to great lengths to conceal his tracks. Throughout The Absinthe Forger, Rail stays away from the sensationalistic — he maintains strict journalistic integrity. He takes pains with accuracy and, in order to receive critical data, is forced to compromise: he identifies the forger only by a pseudonym. In the end, readers may decide for themselves whether this represents adequate justice for a con man who so upset a once-happy world of absinthe worshippers.

That said, the book is being billed as “an astonishing true crime story,” which is a bit of publicists’ hype. This is not a tale propelled by a hunt for a serial killer or the unmasking of a mole deep in a country’s security apparatus. The claim that cracking a “mystery” is driving the narrative is a bit thin. However, in the opening and closing chapters, especially when the author takes the journalistic license to “imagine” scenes, The Absinthe Forger attains considerable suspense. At times, as when he travels to a German village to meet privately with a scientist who uses gas chromatography to prove the suspect bottles are fake, the book takes on the investigative flavor of The Forensic Files.

If absinthe’s underground rep for danger has dimmed with time, its mythic stature has not. There was, after all, something Faustian in the prospect of an elixir that promised to reveal glimpses of the divine while simultaneously burning pits of fire in the seeker’s brain. For artists the lure was the possibility of sailing over barriers of consciousness and attaining artistic enlightenment, pushing open the doors of perception in order to “break on through to the other side.” Or maybe they just enjoyed the naughty buzz. For the absinthe-curious, wondering about those who spend their lives fanning the Green Fairy’s original “spirit,” this enjoyable book will provide a mildly hallucinogenic sip.

David Daniel blogs regularly at www.https://richardhowe.com/