ITALIAN for your stories - tips and samples.

INTRODUCTION

Writing about characters belonging to different cultures and speaking different languages is tough.

Making them look credible is even harder.

Many people love writing romantic stories where the love interest is a handsome and charming Italian man (or a beautiful and provocative woman).

For example, there are plenty of stories involving the mysterious and seductive Italian mafia boss that falls in love with the common woman.

To make them look real, writers use some Italian words. That is very honorable of them, I must say.

However, most of them don't know Italian, nor do they speak it, so they end up using words that are either improper or ...  *cringe*.

This is where I come in. I am Italian!

I am here to help you to make your character turn into an irresistible and attractive Italian man (or woman!).

First of all, Italians speak in different ways according to where they live.

Most of them speak dialects and not perfect Italian. It is inevitable.

For example, if your love interest is from Napoli, he will speak the Neapolitan dialect.

If he is from Venice, he will speak the Venetian dialect.

If your man is a common Italian man, don't fear, just make him speak normal Italian.

However, if your character is from the criminal world, and you want to make him look real, dangerous, you need to use dialect expressions.

The Sicilian mafia boss is the Italian mafia boss par excellence (although there are other types of mafias in Italy), and he uses the Sicilian dialect.

I have watched many movies that faithfully represent the criminal world in Italy, and the use of Italian is limited or rare.

You can ask other Italian people, too, if you want to be sure.

The use of dialect is very high in the South of Italy, more than in the North of Italy.