I ‘ve already written briefly about French wine in an earlier post (‘Classy’ – May 2017) but I simply couldn’t resist taking a photo of this wine bottle when I spotted it on the supermarket shelves recently. Difficult to walk past it!
When I first arrived in France, more than twenty years ago, the labels on wine bottles were very plain and all looked very similar. They typically had a creme background black writing – occasionally with a touch of red ink – and possibly a little sketch of a chateau or a bunch of grapes. Things have changed since then and all sorts of colours, images and words are used as you can see.
I might be wrong, but I doubt you’d find such a label in an English-speaking country and I’m quite sure that you wouldn’t find the same name- translated into French – appearing on bottles here in France.
It think that it can be easier to use rude words (‘gros mots’) in languages other than your own as they don’t carry as much weight and can even be a little amusing.
Mind you… the middle finger doesn’t need translating, in any language, and so I must say I found it a little more surprising to see it flashing boldly at all of the passing supermarket customers.
Start with intention 