Italian All-in-One For Dummies (171 page)

odiare
(
to hate
)

pensare
(
to think
)

temere
(
to fear
)

volere
(
to want
)

Your meaning determines the tense. If, for example, you say that someone
gave a party,
or in a fairy tale,
gave a ball,
you use the present perfect:
lui ha organizzato un ballo.
But if he
gave parties (for beneficence; to raise funds)
for some purpose, then use the imperfect:
lui organizzava balli [di beneficenza; per raccogliere fondi].
However, all the physical and emotional states of being introduced with
avere
and
essere
are likely to appear in the imperfect tense (as opposed to the present perfect).

Adding Nuance to Meaning with Verb Tense

La sfumatura
(
nuance
) is an art historical term that refers to shading. Choice of verb tenses allows you to add nuance to your Italian. Not all verbs undergo changes in meaning, but those that do can lend precision to your language.

Pensare
(
to think
) doesn't change meaning.
Ho pensato
(
I had a thought
), in the present perfect, and
pensavo
(
I was thinking
), in the imperfect, essentially mean the same thing.

The prepositions that follow
pensare,
however, do modify the meaning to some degree.
Pensare a
means
to think about,
and you can express it as
ci penso
(
I'm thinking about it
); this phrase can be useful when confronted with an overzealous store clerk.
Pensare di,
on the other hand, means
to intend to
.
Non pensavo di interrompere
(
I didn't intend to interrupt
).

Five other verbs have more definite changes in meaning, depending on the tense you use. See
Table 1-7
for these verbs' subtleties of meaning.

Some of these changes are slight, but they allow you to achieve a certain specificity of language. Probably the most important changes are in
conoscere, sapere,
and
dovere.

La madre di Marco? Non la conoscevo ma l'ho conosciuta ieri.
(
Marco's mother? I didn't know her but met her yesterday.
)

Sapeva usare il cambio manuale.
(
She/he knew how to use manual transmissions.
)

Dovevo studiare, ma non ne avevo voglia.
(
I was supposed to study, but I didn't feel like it.
) Compare this with
Ho dovuto studiare per l'esame.
(
I had to study for the exam.
)

A side effect of using the imperfect involves manners. It's simply more polite to say that you wanted to see someone (
volevo vedere il dottore
) than to say that you want to see someone. Consider the English counterparts.
I want to see the doctor. I wanted to see the doctor.
The second sentence is less brusque. The same holds true for the Italian.

Chapter 2

Reflexive Verbs in the Past

In This Chapter

Using reflexive and reciprocal verbs in the present perfect

Exploring imperfect reflexive and reciprocal verbs

Using the present perfect versus the imperfect for reflexives

Y
ou use reflexive verbs in Italian throughout the day, from when you wake to when you fall asleep. Reflexive verbs often express personal actions, such as ways you care for yourself. For example, to say that you brushed your teeth, you use the verb
lavarsi i denti.
You also use reflexive verbs to communicate ways you interact with others, for example,
innamorarsi
(
to fall in love
).

The reflexive part of a reflexive verb refers to the pronouns that you use to accompany them. For example, you say
mi chiamo
to indicate
my name is
(literally:
I call myself
)
because
mi
indicates where you're directing the action of
chiamo
(
I call
).
Si innamorano
means
they fall in love with each other;
innamorano
means
they fall in love,
and the pronoun
si
means
with each other
.

The reflexive infinitive is a variation of the
-are, -ere,
and
-ire
infinitives. It drops the
-e
from all three and replaces it with
-si.
This conjugation tells you that the verb reflects action back onto the subject through an added pronoun, called, appropriately enough, the
reflexive pronoun.

Reciprocal verbs are a type of reflexive verb; they're verbs that indicate that an action is being performed on two or more subjects equally and at the same time. Reciprocal verbs are a combination of a verb and a reciprocal pronoun:
mi, ti, si, ci, vi,
or
si.

This chapter shows you how reflexive and reciprocal verbs work in the present perfect tense, walks you through using these verbs in the imperfect tense, and explains how to choose between the present perfect and the imperfect. Check out
Chapter 3
in Book IV for a list of commonly used reflexive verbs and pronouns;
Chapter 1
in Book V introduces the present perfect and imperfect tenses.

Forming the Present Perfect of Reflexive Verbs

The present perfect lets you talk about the past in specific terms. It answers the question
What happened?
or
What did you do?
It refers to a completed past action or event.

The present perfect is a compound tense, consisting of a past participle (such as
saw, went, bought, looked,
or
asked
) and a conjugated helping verb — in this case,
essere
(
to be
). All reflexive verbs conjugate with
essere.
Always. Without exception.

To discuss the past with a reflexive verb, you need three words:

The reflexive pronoun:
This pronoun reflects the action of the verb back onto the subject:
mi
(
myself
),
ti
(
yourself
),
si
(
himself, herself, itself, yourself
[formal]),
ci
(
ourselves
),
vi
(
yourselves
), and
si
(
themselves, yourselves
[formal]).

The helping verb:
This is the conjugated form of
essere
that's appropriate to the subject.

The past participle of the verb you're using:
For example,
Mi sono svegliato/svegliata
(
I woke [myself] up
). In English, you don't usually state the
self
being addressed by the verb. The past participle reflects the gender and number of both the giver and the receiver of the action. If you're a woman, you say
svegliata,
ending the past participle with the feminine singular
-a.
A man says
svegliato,
using the masculine singular ending,
-o.
(Flip to
Chapter 1
in Book V to review how to form the present perfect tense and how to form past participles.)

Table 2-1
shows you how these three words fit together and how the pronoun and participle reflect the subject. The table demonstrates these concepts using the verb
alzarsi
(
to get [oneself] up
).

Table 2-1 Conjugation of the Reflexive Verb Alzarsi in the Present Perfect Tense