hot
cold
soft
hard
fat
velvet
satin
loud
quiet
io
tu
lui
lei
esso
essa
noi
voi
loro
essi
esse
And so forth.
She looked up at him wonderingly.
“I’ve made a list of words related to the opera and theater, for a start. Both in English and Italian. In this column”—he gestured—“are adjectives. In this column is a list of verbs, in this one, pronouns,and this one, prepositions. I thought we’d use our time by learning categories of words—clothing, food, conveyances, emotions, colors, buildings. You can study them in your spare time and practice what you learn by writing . . . let’s say, ten to twenty sentences or more each night, conjugated. I’ll test you each day in a different way.”
It was a startlingly efficient lesson plan, concocted while he’d simultaneously held a conversation with her. She could only imagine what the inside of his brain looked like. His entire life was probably sorted into neat little columns.
And it was thrilling. She loved knowing that she would soon impose some sense on anything in her world, let alone the swirl of Italian with which she was often surrounded.
“Conjugate,” she repeated. “I like satin slippers. He likes satin slippers. Shelikedsatin slippers. They like satin slippers. Like that?”
“Like that. Do you like satin slippers?”
“Idolike satin slippers.” She referred to her list. “Mi...piacciono...le scarpe di raso!”
She looked up at him, delighted.
“Very good. Your accent is already creditable. Does this sound like a reasonable approach to our lessons?”
