Forced Classical Style is Most Deadly: The Quirky Translations of NetEase Cloud Music

The overly elegant yet inaccurate translations on NetEase Cloud Music have drawn widespread criticism from netizens.

NetEase Cloud Music is one of the most popular music streaming apps in China, loved by many music enthusiasts for its extensive song library and convenient comment section. However, the lyrics translations within the app are user-generated, meaning that often the first translation uploaded becomes the accepted version. This has led to some particularly bizarre translations that have sparked complaints, especially among students majoring in English and translation—who might find themselves speechless in frustration at certain translations.

In the comments section of some highly popular songs, many straightforward English lyrics have been transformed into pretentious and distorted new works. Translators often inject a large amount of subjective imagination into their interpretations, attempting to appear literary while forcing new phrases into the lyrics. Although the rhetorical devices used are often extravagant, they fail to hold up under scrutiny, with some translators completely misunderstanding the original meaning of the lyrics. Popular songs like Coldplay's "Viva La Vida," "Counting Stars," Passenger's "Let Her Go," and Charlie Puth and Wiz Khalifa's "See You Again" have become hotspots for such mistranslations. For instance, translating "Take that money and watch it burn" as "Material possessions can be discarded" or rendering "And I'll tell you all about it when I see you again" as "When your shadow appears, I will recount my longing." Perhaps the most laughable instances involve translating the "oh oh oh oh oh" parts of the songs into various original sentences. Despite numerous issues, these translations have received rave reviews in the comment sections.

As Yan Fu once said, the ideal translation achieves fidelity, expressiveness, and elegance. However, translators often cannot fulfill all three criteria, with fidelity being the most important. If the original meaning of the author is distorted, it can hardly be considered a qualified translation. Current translation theories advocate that translated works should faithfully reproduce the content and style of the original, meaning there should be no distortion of the original meaning, no arbitrary additions or omissions, and no alteration of the language style. Therefore, translation should be context-specific, requiring loyalty to the original text rather than forcing all translations into a classical literary style.

However, very often, translators are aware that their approach is incorrect but must conform to the demands of audiences, clients, and superiors, leading them to translate the lyrics in such a manner. Those who have participated in lyric translation jobs have recounted experiences where their translations were returned due to not sounding beautiful enough. This suggests that some archaic translations are done out of necessity, forced upon them despite their better judgment.

Ignoring context to impose a classical style, disguising mistranslations with superficial elegance, and failing to understand the differences between two cultures and languages create diverse market preferences. If these factors continue to exist, it is likely that quirky translations will keep emerging, continuing to provoke people's reactions.

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