Heather Broster
One word in particular echoed throughout the shark documentary my son and I watched the other evening: torbido, used every few minutes to describe the murky depths with which the scuba-divers had to contend. torbido In English, we have the word turbid, which comes from the same Latin origin turbidus, but we would be more …
When we want to describe something that ends in an exciting, impressive, successful or spectacular manner, we can use the following expressions in English: In Italian, every single one of these expressions can be encapsulated by chiudere in bellezza, which literally translates as “to close in beauty”. An alternative expression is finire in bellezza, which …
I don’t know about you, but I tend to be irresistibly drawn to words that sound exactly like the thing or action they describe. These onomatopoeic gems are relatively rare but I find that they infuse language with such flavour and vibrance, especially in one as naturally melodic as Italian! Today we will be talking …
The other day, my friend Jean – with whom I run a series of Italian language immersion trips in Italy – admitted that she was still struggling with the correct usage of the conjunction finché in Italian. Surprised that I hadn’t already covered this word, I promised her I’d make it a priority, so here …
In Italian, if you want to say that something is easy to do, you might say è facile / semplice (it’s easy), è molto facile / semplice (it’s very easy), or è facilissimo / semplicissimo (it’s very easy). All these expressions are just fine, but if you want to go for something a bit more …
Whenever you want to say that you are happy to take care of an issue, or deal with a problem, consider using the very useful Italian expression Ci penso io! Let’s break it down bit by bit. Ci penso io! I’ll take care of it / deal with it / see to it! Let’s start …