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- Topic: Italian >
- "Sono davvero spiacente."
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"Sono davvero spiacenti", but more likely "Gli dispiace moltissimo" or "Sono mortificati".
"Mortified" :) I like that. You turned it into the plural, though, vero? Would the singular be "Mi dispiace moltissimo" "Sono mortificata"? (fem?) Grazie Mille!
thank you, got it. The discussions are most of the time more helpful than duolingo ! But after all, duolingo is free of charge. And without duolingo no discussions. ;-)
And if the women are sorry...? Sono davvero spiacente ... What's wrong with that ?
What's wrong is that spiacente is singular, regardless of gender :) They'll still be "spiacenti".
What's the difference between "molto" and "moltissimo"? Because would "mi dispiace molto" or "gli dispiace molti" be correct also or no?
Moltissimo is a stronger version of molto, more like extremely than very. Note that molto/moltissimo are adverbs, not adjectives, and so don't change with number and gender. So mi dispiace molto is fine, but gli dispiace molti isn't.
Couldn't you just say Loro at the begining of the sentence to specify whether you mean they or I?
Does anyone know the difference between 'spiacente', 'scusa' and 'mi dispiace' and in which situations they are each used in?
"Sono spiacente" is rather formal and rarely used in everyday speech. "Scusa" or "mi dispiace" are more common.
correct! and an even more informal way. is to say 'mi spiace' rather than 'mi dispiace' :) but it's getting a bit 'sloppy' like saying wotcha or gonna in English!
"Scusi" is the (grammatically) formal address (corresponding to "Lei"), "scusa" the informal (corresponding to "tu") one. So among friends you'd probably use "scusa", for strangers "scusi". But be aware that either can sound too sloppy for any non-trivial offence. If you really did something wrong it's better to err on the polite side. You can keep "sono davvero spiacente" for ruining someone's marriage or something like that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KniUNdVZvH4 :)
Weird, given the verb forms it seems like it should be the other way around, Scusa for lei, "lei mangia", and scusi for tu, "tu mangi".
Ah thanks, interesting, I use it a lot. What does it literally mean? "(will) you excuse (me)"?
Thanks wataya!
Is scusi or permesso the correct word to use when you are, for example, looking to get past someone in a crowded place?
I guess both "con permesso?" and "scusi?" work in that situation. I personally always use the latter. Not a native speaker, though.
I believe mi dispiace and spiacente are the informal and formal for "I'm sorry" but scusa/i is much more like "excuse me" and as far as I know is used like it. In Hebrew there are also 2 words for sorry one equivalent to "excuse me" or "forgive me" or "pardon" and one is more like "sorry".
Is there a difference between when to use "davvero", "veramente" and "proprio"?
Which leads me a little off topic, but I get confused with the different meanings of "proprio". That word (when changed to match the subject) can mean either "his/her/their own [possession]" and "really/truly", correct?
Right, for example "lui ha il proprio letto" means "he has his own bed."
As for the other words that you're asking about, you could say "io sono proprio/davvero/veramente stanco," which means "I am really tired." But if you wanted to say "Really?", you'd never say "Proprio?" You'd instead say "Davvero?" or "Sul serio?"
living in italy I've found that nobody ever uses "spiacente". moreover when i used to say spiacente to people they wouldn't understand or looked at me weirdly. the two ways to say sorry are "scusa"(just a light hearted apology, like when you accidently bump into someone) and "mi dispiace"(serious apology). and use "scusi" for "excuse me", not " scusa" coz apparently thats "sorry"
when do you use spiacenti - and when spiacente. I do not understand the tense here. Is it like scusa and scusi as stated above?
You would say: "I really am sorry," when you're emphasizing it is not a insincere apology, or if someone gives you a look like, Yeah,sure.
You use, "I am really sorry," to mean the depth of your sorrow.
Hope this helps!
So why is this "sono davvero spiacente" rather than "sono molto spiacente"? Any difference or are they interchangeable as "really" and "very" are in English?
davvero means "really" in the sense of "truly" or "actually". molto means "really" in the sense of "very", not questioning it's authenticity, but it's magnitude.
if you split up the word "davvero", you almost have "da vero", or "of real"
Thanks for asking, I never really noticed how "really" has two meanings in english. This is why I love learning languages!
Well thanks for replying! And that makes sense, thanks for clearing it up. (But I feel like there are so many words that translate to a form of 'really'... it's all confusing lol)
like 'veramente,' 'molto,' and maybe some others I have seen translated as 'really'
The adjective spiacente is used for both masculine and feminine single, spiacenti is used for both plurals. So "they are really sorry" will be "sono davvero spiacenti".
I translated this as "I am really displeased", and DL accepted that. Is that a mistake on DL's part, or can spiacente mean "displeased" (as in "I don't like what just happened but it wasn't my fault") as well as "sorry" (as in an apology).
It's literally the difference between really and very. We often use really (davvero), or truly, to mean very (molto), as in "I'm really tired", but sometimes really/davvero carries the original meaning of being real and not fake. (Davvero = Da + vero = in truth.) In a sentence like "I may look 15 but I'm really 21", you can't replace "really" with "very". Of course, "I'm really sorry" is ambiguous, and could either mean "I'm very sorry" or "my sorrow is sincere".
By the way, the word "very" comes from the Latin "verus", meaning "true", which is the same as the root for davvero. People have been using "truly" to mean "very" for a very long time.
I had not seen that in my first search through the comments, thank you for the explanation!
It's more like an English question, but I thought that if you want to emphasize 'really', as in you are saying it honestly, you could translate 'sono davvero spiacente' to 'I really am sorry', but it wasn't accepted. It's that an incorrect or just a rare order of words?
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"I really am sorry" is correct. However, it's emphasis is slightly different from "I'm really sorry".
'Truly' marked wrong!?! It's synonymous with 'really'! DL needs to be smarter than this.
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What is the difference between molto and davvero? Would Sono molto spiacente be correct?
You're missing a verb. If you're asking about Loro sono davvero spaciente, see f.formica's comments from 6 years ago.
