André Simon

André Simon (28 February 1877 – 5 September 1970) was a French-born wine merchant, gourmet, and prolific writer about wine. Hugh Johnson describes him as "the charismatic leader of the English wine trade for almost all of the first half of the 20th century, and the grand old man of literate connoisseurship for a further 20 years".

Biography Simon was born in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, France. They had five children: two sons, Andre Louis Ernest Henry, born in 1906 and Peter Jerome, born in 1910, a daughter Madeleine Jeanne V M, b.1912 and two other daughters.

Two years later he became the London agent for the champagne house of Pommery & Greno, based at 24 Mark Lane. With the ending of Prohibition in the United States in 1933, Simon made his first trip to North America the following year. On 11 December 1934, he founded in New York City a branch of what would become the International Wine & Food Society, and branches across the US, Australia and South Africa soon followed.

André Simon died in 1970. On what would have been his 100th birthday in 1977, 400 guests gathered at the Savoy to drink to his memory with Château Latour 1945 that he had left for the occasion. Hugh Johnson has called Simon's "figures of speech and choice of phrases deliciously oblique"; However, not everyone appreciates such purple prose; Robert Parker developed his 100-point rating scale as a reaction against this style of writing. They are joined by a wine expert and a food expert invited by the Trustees. A shortlist of six food books and six wine books is published in November, with the final Awards made in March. The prize money has increased to £2000 for the winner in each category, and the "Special Commendation" earns £1000.