Essential Italian Grammar

by Olga Ragusa

This book provides all the grammar you need, and is the ideal supplement to a phrasebook. All the grammatical points are illustrated with useful phrases and sentences and presented so clearly that most of them can be memorised after a single reading. No previous knowledge of grammatical terms or of Italian grammar is assumed. There is a separate section on grammatical terms and each chapter begins with essentials and proceeds logically from there.

Genres: Italian Literature, Language, Reference

128 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1963

Reviews

[S. B. Letham]

Really useful guide to Italian grammar. Very compact but dense; there's no fluff found here. It is hard to tell if some of the politeness conventions are out of date or not, but at least 90% of what is contained is still applicable.
Would have appreciated a pronunciation guide - for example, is Che pronounced with a "k" sound or "ch" sound? (I think it's pronounced like "que" but I'm still not sure)
Some of the section on Verbs gets really hard to follow if you're not a grammar expert. Ragusa always gives an explanation, but it's still easy to get lost among the numerous tenses and conjugations. But most of the book is easy enough to follow even if you have a hard time with grammatical vocabulary.
I intend to read through again after I've learned more.

[Yanni]

Excellent succinct review

I already spoke 5 languages and picked up Italian on my own. This book was ideal for me. Giving you the framework and rules to form phrases and express yourself in Italian. Excellent to read from cover to cover and for refreshing weak areas. Love it. Succinct and to the point with logical progression

[Jose A Rodriguez Rosa]

Not enough material, examples and content.

The last half of this book is about the definition of grammar terms in english and a huge catalog of other books. It seems that this part takes a disproportionate amount of space. The First half goes in to italian grammar, but it is very concise and with few examples. Many tables are small pictures that the reader have to expand and the material can not be highlighted in the tables. The book is in general a miss opportunity and left you somehow disappointed, however, it can be used as a quick reference.

[bruno]

En essència era el que buscava des de feia temps: una gramàtica bàsica d'italià per a poder conèixer els trets idiosincràtics que el distingeixen de les altres llengües romàniques que parlo i que conec. Ara bé, potser hauria estat més convenient per a aquest propòsit una gramàtica comparada de català-italià o castellà-italià (o fins i tot de francès-italià o portuguès-italià), perquè moltes de les diferències ressaltades respecte de l'anglès no tenen cap mena de complicació per a un catalanoparlant ni un castellanoparlant. D'altra banda, he notat que hi havia algun aspecte obsolet, en el sentit que en la taula del sistema de pronoms italià en donava preferència a alguns que avui dia no són els estàndards o, si més no, els més comuns en la llengua oral ni escrita, amb la qual cosa no me n'he acabat de refiar del tot. L'apartat dels verbs ha estat tan exhaustiva que m'ha fet desencantar-me de la lectura unes quantes setmanes, i mira que el llibre com a tal és curt. De tota manera, en conjunt, llegir aquesta gramàtica ha estat un primer acostament satisfactori a l'idioma italià.

[Gina]

Does one ever "finish" with grammar?

If you want practice exercises, you will need to look elsewhere.

I love this book! Unlike the grammar workbooks that are heavy tomes, this book is portable and easy to digest. Also, it's not visually overwhelming -- as so many of the modern language learning books are.

[George Marshall]

A simple, but well executed book. Based on other Italian instruction, I would not follow guidance to use Loro forms for "formal" plural second person, but no harm in being familiar!

Will have to review future and conditional forms again very soon!

[Jason]

This appears to be a fantastic reference that clearly covers grammatical rules in the Italian language. If only I'd had so thorough a study of English grammar! I strongly recommend owning this book to ANYONE learning Italian.

[Eric]

Bought it before going to italy with the intent of mastering the language. Hah! I did however pick up the grammar and learn better pronunciation.

[Stacee]

Time to refresh...

[howl of minerva]

Mi sbagliero' ancora con il congiuntivo...

[Joe]

Read within a month period. Will be referring to in the future. Currently making anki cards.