Italian All-in-One For Dummies (117 page)

With the adverbs
bene
(
well
),
male
(
badly
),
molto
(
much
), and
poco
(
little
), you only have special forms to express the comparatives and superlatives of these qualities, listed in
Table 4-5
.

Table 4-5 Comparatives and Superlatives of Adverbs with Special Forms

In all other respects, you use these special forms as you use the other ­comparatives.

Umberto è il più grande dei fratelli
or
Umberto è il fratello maggiore.
(
Umberto is the oldest of the siblings.
)

Penso che il parmigiano sia migliore della fontina
or
Penso che il parmigiano sia più buono della fontina.
(
I think that parmesan is better than fontina.
)

Chapter 5

Meeting the Challenge of Prepositions

In This Chapter

Sorting out articles combined with basic prepositions

Creating complements with prepositions and nouns, names, or pronouns

P
repositions
are invariable words you need to link other words in a sentence when adding a name, pronoun, or noun by itself isn't enough. For example,
I'm going school
isn't a complete sentence; you need to say,
I'm going
to
school.

Choosing one preposition over another leads you to say different things, such as
I'm speaking to you
or
I'm speaking about you.
One preposition can also play different functions. In the sentence
I'm at home,
the word
at
conveys place. In the sentence
He's at ease,
it conveys someone's feelings. On the other hand, different prepositions can convey similar meanings, as with
in the evening
or
at night.

Prepositions are difficult to master in any language because their use is idiomatic in many cases. The basic rule, therefore, is practice, practice, and more practice. This chapter guides you through the main Italian prepositions (called
preposizioni semplici
[
simple prepositions
]) and how to combine them with articles. You discover how to choose the preposition that corresponds to the one you'd use in English in the same situation, because literal translation won't do. For example, the preposition
di
usually translates to
of,
but in the expression
to think of someone,
you use
a,
which usually means
at
or
to:
pensare a qualcuno.

Combining Basic Prepositions with Articles

Italian has eight basic prepositions, corresponding to the basic prepositions used in English. They're listed here in order of most-frequently used. You find the translation that reflects their meanings in the two languages, but keep in mind that you can't assume that you'll use the same preposition in Italian and English every time.

di
(
of; about
)

a
(
at; to
)

da
(
from; by
)

in
(
in; into
)

con
(
with
)

su
(
on; onto
)

per
(
for; through
)

fra/tra
(
between; among
)

With prepositions, the word order is strict: A preposition precedes and is never separated from the word with which it forms a unit of meaning; for example,
a me
(
to me
) and
con coraggio
(
with courage
).
The girl whom I was thinking of
can be translated only as
La ragazza a cui pensavo
(
The girl of whom I was thinking
).

When you have a definite article between a preposition and a noun, you fuse six of the eight prepositions with the articles to form one word.
Table 5-1
lists the simple prepositions in their combined forms.