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I was talking to my Italian professoressa and we were basically discussing how our long weekend went. Being an Italian class, she expected me to describe the whole endeavor in Italiano. However, our conversation stopped when I said the phrase, Noi avevamo molto divertiti. To this, my professoressa responded, That is incorrect. Italians do not have fun. (she emphasized the "have")

At this point, she was about to explain herself, but one of the higher board members came in to talk to her and eventually she had to leave the classroom.

Why does Noi avevamo molto divertiti not work as a phrase? I'm assuming that in Italian, some other verb must be used; however, I am not exactly sure which one that could possibly be.

martina.physics
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Veer Singh
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3 Answers3

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Your misconception arises from trying to translate too literally idiomatic expressions. To give a simpler example, in English you pay attention but in Italian fai attenzione (you do attention). In English you have a shower but in Italian fai una doccia (you do a shower).

Similarly, in English you have fun, but in Italian ti diverti (you fun yourself). That is we use a verb which literally means "to have fun". This verb is divertirsi and it has the auxiliary essere (to be). So the correct translation is

Ci siamo divertiti molto

("We funned ourselves a lot")

Denis Nardin
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    Even if noi ci eravamo divertiti corresponds, as a verbal tense, to the suggested, non-existent noi avevamo molto divertiti, speaking of past weekend I'd say ci siamo divertiti (unless this is part of a longer story: ci eravamo divertiti, ma poi è scoppiata la tragedia). And I'd take the occasion to suggest the OP omitting the explicit subject: ci siamo divertiti (unless, again, it is important to contrast the sentence with something else: noi ci siamo divertiti, ma i nostri amici rimasti in città si sono annoiati mortalmente). – DaG Mar 29 '16 at 08:20
  • @DaG Sure, without more context it's impossible to determine the correct tense. I erred on the side of keeping the tense in the OP but maybe I should incorporate your explanation – Denis Nardin Mar 29 '16 at 11:31
  • @DaG The basic context is that I was discussing how me and my good friends went out to New York City, and thus "we had a lot of fun." I do appreciate the help and answers too. Thanks! :) – Veer Singh Mar 29 '16 at 13:27
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    Non sarebbe meglio c'eravamo divertiti? O ci siamo divertiti, perché eravamo ha un significato un po' diverso. – egreg Mar 29 '16 at 13:41
  • @DigitalVeer The correct translation of we had a lot of fun is ci siamo divertiti molto, as DaG says. egreg: I dislike those elisions in writing but I suppose it's a matter of taste – Denis Nardin Mar 29 '16 at 13:44
  • Apart from the well-known use of diversion in the sense of "amusement, entertainment, sport, pastime." the Oxford English Dictionary also gives a reflexive use of the verb divert (now rare) meaning "To entertain, amuse, recreate oneself; to give oneself to diversion." One of the examples the OED provides is from Defoe's Crusoe: "I used frequently to visit my boat...sometimes I went out in her to divert myself." [emphasis added by me]. Hopefully this will help some English speakers feel more comfortable with the Italian use of the reflexive divertirsi for 'having fun'... – J.Past Aug 25 '16 at 19:01
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The verb in Italian for 'to have fun' is divertirsi. (Notice it is reflexive as is often indicated by the -irsi ending.) Reflexive verbs are conjugated with the auxiliary verb essere (as opposed to avere). The correct conjugation your professoressa was looking was:

ci siamo divertiti molto.

Side note: This kind of mistake happens often in the beginning Italian classroom when translating from English. My personal favorite mistake of a mistranslation is "abbiamo avuto un buon tempo" when a student wants to say "we had a good time" when in reality they were saying "We had a good weather."

gbutters
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  • To add to the confusion, avere (or darsi) (un) buon tempo, literally to have (a) good time, is a (very archaic, dating to the 1200) italian form. – LSerni Mar 30 '16 at 09:09
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As Italian mother-tongue speaker I approve the explanation of gbutters, but the correct translation is: "Noi ci siamo divertiti."

Charo
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Desarius
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    Welcome! In my mother language (Italian), the pronoun “noi” would be omitted. ;-) – egreg Mar 29 '16 at 13:39
  • Omitting pronouns is not a good thing to do, we do not do that always, depends on situation and coherence of the phrase.. – Desarius Mar 31 '16 at 14:35
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    You should admit that the pronoun is omitted more often than not. Much more, I'd say. – egreg Mar 31 '16 at 16:29
  • It's omitted but not so often, also omitting pronouns too often in Italian lead to incomprehensible mess with the real subjects of the phrase.
    So why create problems where there isn't anyone ?

    So for the 100% correct translation

    "Noi ci siamo divertiti molto" === "we had a lot of fun"

    Then we can argue about our common use of that phrase in Italian..

    Non è che non si usi dire "Ci siamo divertiti molto" ma semplicemente dipende Ma questo tipo di osservazioni complicate rischia solo di complicare la comprensione del linguaggio. Poi che si usi molto e spesso a sproposito è indubbio...

     – Desarius Apr 01 '16 at 15:02
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    Sorry, but the correct answer to “Vi siete divertiti?” is “Ci siamo divertiti”, without noi. In standard Italian, at least. If we want to teach Italian, we should follow standard usage. – egreg Apr 01 '16 at 15:09
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    Desarius, can you name a single, reliable source supporting your view that “Omitting pronouns is not a good thing to do”? Should Dante's Inferno begin Nel mezzo ... io* mi ritrovai per una selva oscura*? – DaG Apr 01 '16 at 20:13
  • I could give you an infinite list of children grammar book, but I prefer to cite : "L'italiano. Lezioni semiserie" of Beppe Severgnini. – Desarius Apr 08 '16 at 12:26