English translation: that special something//a certain piquancy
Login or register (free and only takes a few minutes) to participate in this question.
You will also have access to many other tools and opportunities designed for those who have language-related jobs (or are passionate about them). Participation is free and the site has a strict confidentiality policy.
Russian to English translations [PRO] Art/Literary - Poetry & Literature
Russian term or phrase:изюминка
контекст: В каждой женщине должна быть изюминка, которая будет приводить в восторг ее избранника.
вопрос: Должно быть, я где-то не там ищу, но не могу найти эквивалент в английском... изюминка, то есть характерная черта, которой она отличается от других... нужен перевод, а не описание... должен же быть... спасибо :)
I went to lunch with a colleague, and her face kept losing a layer of stucco with each course. By the time they brought us our desert she looked thirty years older (ten years per layer). That's frosting alright!
I must concur with Mark, albeit with a slightly different emphasis. For me, it's not as much a matter of hanging out in an anglophone environment as a matter of context/literary "nose" – suff like that... which, come to think of it, does or may imply hanging in an appropriate linguistic mmilieu... So, trousers is a legit term for briuki; hanging out is a legit term for guliaty'/razvlekat'sia, and the like. But put "these trousers are good for hanging out" and you'll have a a subject for horseplay and ribald jokes. Frosting on a woman is for mafia-bosses' deserts. A woman with a frosting on her cake, well just give me a break! The subject matter is vulnerable to much punning, so one must be extra–careful... about that special thing... :)
I don't mean to sound condescending, but if I were you I would defer to someone who has actually lived in an English speaking country most of his life on such nuances. Peeking into the dictionary isn't always sufficient in matters of idiomatic translation.
Joking apart (but never completely!),let's not reify and "thingify"a woman to the extent that SHE is a desirable"object"if she has some extra options under the hood.Sweet as women always seemed to me,they ain't cakes.That sun-dried berry is by no means restricted to women: men are also either with or without it. And it's not some particular zest (as I myself put it, alas: should've stuck to just charm), or spunk, zinginess, or anything IN PARTICULAR. It's simply that lots of people are drips – plain like cod boiled without salt. Those who are not drips have a certain charm, a certain inner grace in them,which doesn't at all mean that they are perforce particularly cheerful, sunny, spunky, always ready to party and groove.Actually, drips party much more.No, one can be totally flascid and melacholic and yet have charm bigger than Everest. Granted, however, the openness of the subject to all sorts of double entendre (as I've joifuly pointed out in my"neutrals"and above...to add to it for example,"X-factor"sounds like "G-spot"... sorry),one must use something,well, shall we say, unequivocal, right?I mean"a woman must have that special thing"just would make stupid people like me laugh!
To Mark. Sorry, but I cannot be in your camp.
Frosting on the cake - an additional benefit to something already good. For example, "All these letters of congratulation are icing on the cake", or "After that beautiful sunrise, the rainbow is just frosting on the cake". This metaphoric expression alludes to the sweet creamy coating used to enhance a cake.
Please take a look: http://www.answers.com/topic/icing-on-the-cake
Hmm... But who said that "one can not define it"? Изюминка -- is rather "something very special about smth/smone", so it is definable with some effort. Charm would be OK, "that special something" too, maybe "the special charm she has"
if you want to borrow a phrase made popular by cruddy Saturday evening TV. If you said she'd got the X-factor, it would mean she has a quality that you can't define, but one that makes her different and special.
"должен же быть..." - Сорри, но совсем не должен. In fact, idioms are almost never translated literally. Most of the time there is an adequate equivalent, but that's not always the case either.
Automatic update in 00:
Answers
5 mins confidence: peer agreement (net): +10
that special something
Explanation: Hope this helps
Mikhail Kropotov Russian Federation Local time: 06:25 Works in field Native speaker of: Russian PRO pts in category: 301
The translation workplace 
peer agreement (net): +10