The Italian Reader

Read Pinocchio in the original Italian without the need for a dictionary.

This volume presents Carlo Collodi's Le avventure di Pinocchio (1883) using the interlinear method. A strictly literal English translation sits directly beneath each line of Italian, allowing you to read the story and absorb the language simultaneously. There is no flipping to a glossary and no breaking your reading momentum.

Our glosses are strictly literal. Rather than smoothing Collodi's nineteenth-century Tuscan into modern English, we preserve his original word order and, wherever possible, use English words that share a root with the Italian. This approach shows you exactly how the language builds a sentence, rather than just telling you what the sentence means.

This edition contains all thirty-six chapters of the complete novel, accompanied by the classic public-domain illustrations by Carlo Chiostri.

Inside this edition:

• The full Italian text of Le avventure di Pinocchio, gently updated for modern readability

• A word-by-word English gloss placed beneath every line of text

• All 36 chapters of the complete novel, organized into five thematic parts

• The original, charming engravings by Carlo Chiostri

• A clear introduction to the interlinear method

This book is ideal for intermediate Italian learners, classroom use, or anyone who has always wanted to experience this literary classic in its original language. Discover the music of Italian prose and learn how the language thinks, one line at a time.