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Tag Archives: Italian past tense

Past, Present and Future, Quiz Solutions Posted by on Jan 12, 2015

Well done to those of you who had a go at last week’s quiz. If you missed it and would like to have a go before reading the solutions you can find it here. In the quiz we asked you to translate a number of sentences into Italian using the appropriate tense of the given…

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Past, Present and Future Posted by on Jan 5, 2015

Here we are at the beginning of a new year, and isn’t it funny how saying something like “I haven’t seen my friend Fabio since last year” makes it seem like a distant event, when in reality I saw him less than a week ago? Past, present and future, now seems like a good time…

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To Be or to Have? Posted by on Feb 7, 2014

If you’re learning Italian, knowing when to use essere or avere when talking about the past in the present perfect (Passato prossimo) is always a challenge. Should I say “Giovanni è vissuto in Inghilterra dal 2002 al 2007” or “Giovanni ha vissuto in Inghilterra dal 2002 al 2007”? I remember once, when I was teaching…

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Da or Per? Posted by on Dec 20, 2008

Yesterday, while teaching English to a private student here in Italy, I came across an interesting example in my English grammar book; it said: “John and Ann have been married for 20 years”. My student translated this sentence into Italian word by word as: “John e Ann sono stati sposati per 20 anni”. This is a wonderful example…

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