You may be familiar with the adjective gentile. We use it when we are talking about someone who is nice, kind, and courteous.

Il povero anatroccolo si accovacciò tra le canne

The poor duckling crouched down among the reeds

e tremava per il freddo.

and trembled because of the cold.

Fortunatamente, passò un contadino gentile

Fortunately, a kind farmer passed by

e se lo portò con sé

and he brought him along with him,

a casa nel suo fienile.

to the hay barn of his house.

Captions 58-62, Ti racconto una fiaba - Il brutto anatroccolo

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1) How about telling this part of the story in the present tense?

The cognate for gentile is "gentle," but "gentle" only corresponds sometimes, not often. In fact, "gentle" often corresponds to delicato.

Seguì un bussare delicato alla porta.

It was followed by a gentle knock at the door.

Caption 38, Ti racconto una fiaba - Il Principe Ranocchio

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There's a brand of bleach called Ace Gentile because it is less harsh than normal bleach, but most of the time, gentile is more about kind and courteous.

Carino vs gentile

You might describe the bank director, your neighbor, the cashier at the grocery store, your doctor, a policeman who wants to give you a ticket but doesn't, etc... with gentile. The more informal version of this is carino.

Eh sì. -Eh sì. Comunque Luca è stato molto carino, eh,

Oh yes. -Oh yes. However Luca was very kind, no,

ad accompagnare suo figlio Fabio all'istituto.

to accompany his son Fabio to the institute.

Captions 26-27, Il Commissario Manara - S1EP1 - Un delitto perfetto

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Carino can also refer to someone or something's physical appearance:

Però, all'epoca era simpatico e pure carino.

But at the time he was nice, and cute, too.

Caption 9, La Ladra - EP.11 - Un esame importante

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2) Here, a gal is talking about a guy. What if it were a guy talking about a gal?

Courtesy and intimacy

But we also use gentile as a description of courtesy in certain expressions, often written, and that's what we're going to talk about here.

If you get a letter from your phone company about their change in fees, or some special promotion, it may start out with, 

Gentile cliente (dear customer)

In English, we use "dear" almost universally for the beginning of a letter, except for informal emails where we will often just write "Hi" and then the name. The equivalent of "dear" is caro, care, cari, or care, and it may be used in many situations, where it can either be warm or cool, depending on the relationship. 

There's a famous movie from 1993 called Caro diario (Dear Diary) with Nanni Moretti. Check out the trailer here!

In an informal letter, caro can be used, and, as a matter of fact, it can be used without any name at all. In this case, it's often used in its superlative form (superlativo assoluto) carissimo, carissima, etc. 

To some, caro implies a certain intimacy or acquaintanceship, so in a less personal kind of letter, caro is often replaced by gentile, which is both polite and generic. It's a good choice when you are in doubt as to what choice to make.

Formal letters

If you are writing a formal letter, you will likely use signor or signora and the last name, or sometimes even the first name of the person you are addressing, or no name at all.

So, a letter could begin with one of the following:

Gentile signora

Gentile signorina

Gentile signora Rossi

Gentile signorina Rossi

Gentile signora Adriana (sometimes we don't feel informal enough to use someone's first name without the signora because of an age difference, for example).

Gentile signor Rossi

Gentili signori (this includes men and women, much like "dear sirs").

We have looked at one way to start a letter, but there are others, so check out Daniela's lessons about writing both informal and formal letters.

Solutions to "Extra credit," as one reader called it...

1) Il povero anatroccolo si accovacia tra le canne e trema per il freddo. Fortunatamente, passa un contadino gentile e se lo porta con sé a casa nel suo fienile.

2) Però, all'epoca era simpatica e pure carina.

The passato remoto (remote past) tense in Italian may not be necessary to know in order to converse in the language, but we find it often enough in writing when the subject is history, so it's good to be familiar with it.

Daniela has recently finished talking about this tense in her Corso di Italiano, and in the final segment, she talks about when it is used.

Si usa, per esempie [sic], per esempio, per azioni che sono avvenute una sola volta nel passato.

You use it, for example, for actions that occurred once, in the past.

Captions 4-5, Corso di italiano con Daniela - Il passato remoto

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In this week's video about Pisa, we see it in action. Arianna is talking about medieval times.

Già dall'inizio ebbe dei problemi, perché fu costruita su un terreno instabile e per questo pende.

From the start it had problems because it was built on unstable terrain and because of this, it leans.

Captions 18-19, In giro per l'Italia - Pisa e dintorni

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Another place we find the passato remoto being employed is in stories and fairy tales. In fact, reading fairy tales is an excellent way to gain familiarity with the passato remoto. The stories are usually repetitive and predictable with the verbs in the third person singular and plural.Yabla has quite a few animated fairy tales to choose from. 

Quindi aprì la porta e il ranocchio saltellò dentro.

So she opened the door and the frog hopped in.

Caption 52, Ti racconto una fiaba - Il Principe Ranocchio

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Further practice:
To make friends with the passato remoto, pick out a fairy tale and watch the video, paying extra attention to the verbs. Then open the transcript, pick the printer-friendly version so you can just see the Italian, and then read the story out loud (in Italian), as if you were reading it to a child. You will, of course, see verbs in other tenses like the passato prossimo and theimperfetto, too. As in English, a mixture of tenses renders the story more fluid and more interesting.

If you're not sure which tense you are looking at, click on the word, even when you are in theprinter-friendly version, and a dictionary will pop up to help you. Some verbs occur only occasionally, and don't really need to be assimilated, but other verbs like avere (to have) essere (to be), andare (to go), venire (to come), guardare (to look), and vedere (to see) will occur more often, and you can start adding them to the verbs you recognize, even in thepassato remoto. Reading out loud will make the verbs start feeling right on the tongue.

BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Hopefully, when you watch the video again, the verbs in the passato remoto won't seem so strange anymore.

WordReference has conjugation charts for most verbs. Try keeping the tab open so you can get to it easily when you need it.

Mantenere (to maintain, to keep)

The primary meaning of mantenere is “to maintain” (a true cognate) or “to keep.”

But it doesn’t mean “keep” as in keeping a lock of someone’s hair. For that, we can use tenere (which is also part of mantenere) or conservare. It’s more about keeping a promise, as in the following example, where the subjunctive of mantenere is used. Affinché (so that, in order for) is the conjunction that requires the subjunctive in this sentence.

Il ranocchio le gridò dietro affinché lei mantenesse la sua promessa.

The frog shouted after her, so that she would keep her promise.

Caption 33, Ti racconto una fiaba - Il Principe Ranocchio

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Mantenere can also imply keeping or maintaining something in a certain condition or position.

Fermo restando che insieme al, alla tintura viene richiesta [sic: vengono richiesti] spesso,

Taking for granted that together with the dye, often we get a request for

i pigmenti colorati che servono per mantenere anche il colore.

color revitalizers that are also used to maintain the color.

Captions 46-47, Professioni e mestieri - Rivenditore per parrucchieri

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È un ballo molto veloce, ritmato, in quattro quarti,

It's a very fast dance, rhythmic, in four four,

dove la caratteristica è mantenere le ginocchia sempre in movimento e alte.

whose characteristic is to always keep the knees moving and up high.

Captions 12-13, Adriano - Jive

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We use mantenere to mean “to support,” too. We use the reflexive form, mantenersi,  to refer to making a living, to supporting oneself.

Si era messo a lavora' da un fornaio pe' mantenesse [per mantenersi], di notte.

He started working at a baker's at night to support himself.

Caption 21, Provaci Ancora Prof! - S1E1 - Il regalo di Babbo Natale

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Un mantenuto is someone who is “kept” or supported by someone else.

Giorgio non ha un lavoro, fa il mantenuto a casa di sua mamma.
Giorgio doesn’t have a job, he is supported by his mother.

Or we could say:

Si fa mantenere dalla sua fidanzata. 
He gets supported by his girlfriend.

See also these other nouns that come from mantenere:

Mantenimento, which is more about financial support of people or animals.

Manutenzione which is more about maintenance and upkeep.

The following example uses both mantenere and manutenzione in a single sentence.

E fornisce molto lavoro, soprattutto per i ragazzi più giovani

And it provides a lot of work, above all for the younger people

che possono lavorare con le barche, possono affittarle, possono

who can work with the boats, (can) rent them, (can)

mantenerne la manutenzione, possono venderle.

keep up with the maintenance, (can) sell them.

Captions 8-10, Milena - al porto di Maratea

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Just for fun:

Ho mantenuto lo stesso giardiniere per vent’anni, perché era molto bravo nellamanutenzione degli atrezzi da giardino, e nel mantenere pulito e rigoglioso il giardino stesso. Inoltre, doveva mantenere cinque figli. Si manteneva con il giardinaggio.

I kept on the same gardener for twenty years because he was very good with the upkeep of the gardening utensils and in keeping the garden itself neat and flourishing. Besides, he had to support five children. He supported himself by doing gardening.

If you knew the Italian subjunctive well, life would be easier, right?

The above is a simple conditional statement. It happens to use the subjunctive, but in English we don’t really notice it because “knew” just looks like the past tense of “to know.” If you think about it, though, it’s an “unreal” past tense. We’re talking hypothetically (unless of course you’re already an expert on the Italian subjunctive), not about the past.

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If we put the above conditional sentence into Italian, we still use a past tense, but it’s a subjunctive past tense called congiuntivo imperfetto (imperfect subjunctive).

Se sapessi bene il congiuntivo italiano, la vita sarebbe più facile, no?

The imperfect subjunctive has different endings from the other conjugations, so it’s impossible to fake! Sapessi is the first person congiuntivo imperfetto of the verb sapere (to know). Here’s the conjugation chart for sapere (to know).

The second part of the sentence uses the conditional, which in English is formed with “would” or “could” (“life would be easier”). Here again, Italian has its own special conjugation for the conditional, called il condizionale, and only needs conjugating in the present. Sarebbe is the third person singular condizionale presente of essere (to be).

The little princess in Il principe ranocchio (The Frog Prince), new at Yabla this week, is wishing she had her golden ball back, but the reality is that it’s at the bottom of the pond and she doesn’t believe she’ll get it back. So we have another hypothetical situation.

Se solo avessi indietro la mia palla d'oro!

If only I had my golden ball back,

Darei tutti i miei bei vestiti e gioielli per lei!

I would give all my fine clothes and jewels for it!

Captions 15-16, Ti racconto una fiaba - Il Principe Ranocchio

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The above example uses the first person congiuntivo imperfetto of avere and the first person condizionale presente of dare.

In a nutshell:

If we break down a conditional statement into its two clauses, we come up with these basic elements.

In the subordinate, or dependent clause:

se (if) +
a verb in the congiuntivo imperfetto

And in the main clause:

a verb in the condizionale presente

Practice:
Here are some examples where the person is the same in both parts of the sentence. The verb conjugated in the subjunctive is essere (to be). The verb conjugated in the conditional is comprare (to buy).

Se io fossi ricca, comprerei una casa.
If I were rich, I would buy a house.
Se tu fossi ricca, compreresti una casa?
If you were rich, would you buy a house?
Se lei fosse ricca, comprerebbe una casa.
If she were rich, she would buy a house.
Se loro fossero ricchi, comprerebbero una casa.
If they were rich, they would buy a house.
Se noi fossimo ricchi, compreremmo una casa.
If we were rich, we would buy a house.
Se voi foste ricchi, comprereste una casa.
If you (pl.) were rich, you would buy a house.

Note that you can switch the two clauses around like this:

Lei comprerebbe una casa se fosse ricca.
She would buy a house if she were rich.

Try the same thing with avere (to have). Here’s an example to get you started.

Se avessi tanti soldi, lavorerei molto meno.
If I had a lot of money, I would work much less.

To get even more practice, keep on using the model, but change the adjectives, the subjunctive verb, and the conditional verb along with the person. If you’re a bit unsure, just change one element in one clause at a time (the person, the subjunctive verb, or the conditional verb). If you’re more advanced, be adventurous!

Keep in mind that the personal pronouns are present when they need to clarify who’s doing what, or for emphasis. Otherwise, they can be included in the verb in both the conditional and the subjunctive. It can get tricky between the first and second person, which have the same endings, and between the third person and polite second person, which have the same endings (see conjugation charts). It’s a good idea to practice it both ways.

BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Don’t worry. Even though the grammar itself might seem daunting and complicated, before you know it, verbs in the subjunctive will become part of your everyday Italian speech.