Breakdown of Spesso nascondiamo l'abitudine di sabotare i progetti.
il progetto
the project
spesso
often
l'abitudine
the habit (f)
nascondere
to hide
di
to (linking a verb to a following infinitive)
sabotare
to sabotage
Questions & Answers about Spesso nascondiamo l'abitudine di sabotare i progetti.
Why does abitudine take the preposition di before the infinitive instead of a?
In Italian, most abstract nouns that take a verb after them require di + infinitive to complete their meaning. Since abitudine (habit) is an abstract noun, it pairs with di. You will also see this with nouns like paura (fear), bisogno (need), and scelta (choice).
English says "habit of sabotaging" with an -ing word. Why doesn't Italian use the gerund sabotando here?
In Italian, whenever a verb directly follows a preposition (like di, a, or per), it must be in the infinitive form (sabotare). The Italian gerund (sabotando) is never used directly after a preposition, even though English naturally uses the -ing form in these exact cases.
The English translation says "sabotaging projects" without "the", but the Italian includes the article: i progetti. Is the article required here?
Yes, if you mean "projects" in a general sense. English drops the article for general plural nouns, but Italian requires the definite article (i). If you dropped it and simply said sabotare progetti, it would mean "sabotaging some projects", which changes the nuance.
Spesso is at the start of the sentence. Could it go after the verb instead?
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