白酒真的叫white wine吗？过几天就是除夕了

过几天就是除夕了，很多人都免不了要喝点白酒，我们今天就来讨论一下如何正确翻译“白酒”。

想到酒，大家应该会马上想到wine，于是把白酒翻译成white wine，但这是不正确的。Oxford Advanced Learner"s English-Chinese Dictionary对wine的解释是：alcoholic drink made from the fermented juice of grapes。也就是说，wine是葡萄酒（由发酵的葡萄汁制成），跟我们所说的白酒相去甚远，white wine是白葡萄酒，red wine是红葡萄酒。

white wine 白葡萄酒

red wine 红葡萄酒

我们来看看BBC官网是如何描述白酒的吧。

Baijiu is a common distilled white liquor in China made from sorghum and other grains. 在中国，白酒是一种常见的用高粱或其他谷物蒸馏制成的烈性酒。

这个句子可以说是白酒的完美定义，有木有？赶紧背下来吧！其中有一个关键词white liquor，跟中国的白酒对应，因此“白酒”是可以翻译为white liquor的，翻译为rice liquor也不错：

Leta Hong Fincher, a frequent commentator on women"s issues in China, notes that "in order to become a powerful official in China, you need to do a lot of banqueting and networking and heavy drinking of baijiu (Chinese rice liquor).

请注意，liquor是烈性酒，因此rice liquor不能理解为米酒，米酒度数比较低，一般由糯米制成，有甜味，一般翻译为rice wine：

An essential ingredient in Chinese cooking and other Oriental cuisines, this sweet wine is made by fermenting freshly steamed glutinous rice (糯米) with yeast and spring water. It"s relatively low in alcohol and can be drunk neat or used in hot dishes, marinades and glazes. It"s often confused with sake and mirin but sake (a Japanese rice-based brewed alcohol) is far more delicate in taste. Substitute dry pale sherry for rice wine if you can1t find rice wine.

有些地方也把“白酒”翻译为Chinese spirit，这种翻译方法在BBC官网上也能找到，下面是一篇报道中国人在网上“拼酒”的新闻节选：

Thousands of videos have sprung up across China showing people sipping, drinking and downing the traditional Chinese spirit Baijiu. It’s called The Baijiu Challenge.

但Chinese spirit容易跟“中国精神”弄混，因此不太好：

He introduced a new term - the "Chinese Dream" - to lay out his vision of a stronger nation based on "the Chinese path", "the Chinese spirit" and "Chinese strength".

总结一下：

白酒 white liquor/rice liquor（前面加上Chinese更能体现指的是中国的白酒）

米酒 rice wine

白葡萄酒 white wine

红葡萄酒 red wine

点击

"阅读原文"

预约免费试听课