thelinguist.uberflip.com
DECEMBER 2017/JANUARY 2018 The Linguist 11
FEATURES
as the most appealing flavour, while men preferred
raisin. Older consumers looked for oak, and dedicated
Chinese wine buffs sought out vanilla and red apple.
"Sometimes we have to find a new way to describe
the flavour notes," confirms Danielle Liu, a freelance
translator who works for the Wine and Spirit Education
Trust (WSET). "I often use roast sweet potato to describe
the caramel aromas in aged wines, and sweetcorn
ice-cream to describe oaked Chardonnay. These
flavours are easier to understand for Chinese people."
'Spicy' is troublesome. "That translates as 'hot' – like
chilli pepper – so we now say 'flavours of cinnamon'."
These more familiar choices aren't always the most
marketable though. "Before I saw the Wine Intelligence
research results I thought Chinese people would prefer
ingredients they know well, such as the wolfberry or
the waxberry," Zhou explains. "Actually, those fruits
were only as popular as cherries, which are not a typical
Chinese fruit." This could be because wine is seen as
an international product. "It's about perception.
Consumers don't necessarily have to know what a
cherry tastes like to find the description appealing. Wine
is quite expensive in China," Zhou expands, "and it is
associated with a sophisticated lifestyle. Chinese
consumers want the description to feel as exclusive as
the wine". More generic words, such as 'smooth',
'refined' and 'full-bodied', which are familiar to
international wine consumers, can help here. The most
common style description used by translators for red
wine is 醇厚 ('chun hou'), a Mandarin word meaning
'mellow and rich'.
A vine by any other name
Translating the name of the winery brings different
challenges. "You need to find words with a similar
pronunciation or meaning to the original," says Liu.
Direct translation can work; for example, for the New
Zealand winery Bilancia, which means 'balance' or
'weighing scales' in Italian, there is a Mandarin
equivalent, 天秤, pronounced 'tian cheng'.
Yet sometimes translating directly results in a very long
name that is neither eye-catching as a brand nor easy for
consumers to remember. Consequently, Liu and her
contemporaries tend to opt for looser translations based
on meaning, sound and 'feel'. Her translation of the
Italian vineyard Isole e Olena is 奥莱娜小岛, pronounced
'ao lai na xiao dao', meaning 'Olena Island'. But
translating the New Zealand winery Greywacke required
some research. "It's a kind of soil found in the vineyard,"
Liu explains. "I literally translated the first part, the colour
grey, to 灰, pronounced 'hui'. Then I used phonetic
translation for the second part to 瓦, pronounced 'wa',
which refers to earthen house tiles that are usually a grey
colour. It is common in Chinese to use two words with
LIFESTYLE CHOICE
Wine in China is
associated with
sophistication, and
consumers look for
descriptions on
the label that give a
sense of exclusivity
IMAGES:
©
SHUTTERSTOCK
