Archive for 'Grammar'
Indovinello Fotografico 3 + soluzione del numero due Posted by Serena on Dec 21, 2009
In my second indovinello fotografico (photo quiz), see Indovinello Fotografico 2 , I asked you to tell me what the connection was between the picture of a flower and la Torre di Pisa (the tower of Pisa). To answer this question you need to know that the flower is called a campanula, or bellflower, and that the leaning tower…
Verbs Followed by the Preposition ‘a’ Posted by Serena on Dec 12, 2009
In my previous article Che or Il Quale I promised you a list of common verbs that are normally followed by the preposition a (to). This preposition is used with the indirect object of verbs such as dare (to give), e.g. Laura ha dato un libro a Giorgio (Laura gave a book to Giorgio). It…
Che or Il Quale? Posted by Serena on Dec 9, 2009
A couple of readers have asked me recently to explain the difference between the pronomi relativi (relative pronouns) che and il quale / la quale (both meaning ‘who’, ‘which’, and ‘that’). Va bene, proviamoci! Che This is the most common form of relative pronoun. It is invariabile (unchangeable), therefore it stays the same in the…
Colloquial Italian – 2. Allora and Dunque Posted by Serena on Nov 9, 2009
In part two of my Colloquial Italian series I’m going to continue exploring those little everyday words that we Italians use all the time, but which are often overlooked in classes and text books. Learning how and where to use them will help to make your spoken Italian sound much more natural. The two words…
Il Congiuntivo Part 5 – Trapassato Posted by Serena on Oct 22, 2009
This article, which deals with il congiuntivo trapassato (the pluperfect subjunctive), concludes my series about the use of the subjunctive form. In order to construct the pluperfect subjunctive you simply use the imperfect subjunctive of the auxiliary verbs essere and avere (see Part – 4 of this series: Congiuntivo Imperfetto), followed by the past participle…
Il Congiuntivo Part 4 – Imperfetto Posted by Serena on Oct 16, 2009
Continuing my series of articles on the subjunctive form, today I’m going to write about il congiuntivo imperfetto (imperfect subjunctive). To make the congiuntivo imperfetto of regular verbs, remove the ending from the infinitive form of the verb, i.e. -are, -ere, or -ire, and add the following: for verbs ending in –are add –assi –assi…
Il Congiuntivo Part 3 – Passato Posted by Serena on Oct 10, 2009
In part 1 of this series on the congiuntivo I explained how to use it in the present tense, il congiuntivo presente. Part 2 consisted of a list of the most common irregular verbs and their present tense conjugations. This included the two verbs essere (to be), and avere (to have) which are essential to…