Forming the Imperative with Italian Verbs

The imperative  (limperativo)  is used to give orders, advice, and exhortation:  be good, stay home, lets go. The formation of the imperative in Italian follows a sort of back-to-front rule for the  tu  and  Lei  forms. In other words,  parlaregenerates  (tu) parla  and  (Lei) parli  - as if the indicative forms had swapped places - while  -ere  and  -ire  verbs behave in exactly the opposite way:  (tu) prendi, (Lei) prenda. Creating the Imperative in Italian To create perfect, oven-fresh imperatives, stick to the following rules: the  tu  and  voi  forms are identical to their corresponding present indicative forms, except for the  tu  form of  -are  verbs, which add  -a  to the root:  domandare  Ã‚  domandathe formal  Lei  and  Loro  forms  (though the second is hardly every used) take the corresponding forms of the present subjunctive (see table below)the  noi  form (translated by lets... in English) also mimics the present subjunctive form - but this is identical to the common or garden-variety present indicative (andiamo, vediamo,  etc.) Regular verbs therefore have the following imperative forms: cantare vendere aprire finire (tu) canta vendi apri finisci (Lei) canti venda apra finisca (noi) cantiamo vendiamo apriamo finiamo (voi) cantate vendete aprite finite (Loro) cantino vendano aprano finiscano Irregular verbs follow the same pattern, except for  essere  and  avere, which have rule-bending  tu  and  voi  forms: essere avere (tu) sii abbi (Lei) sia abbia (noi) siamo abbiamo (voi) siate abbiate (Loro) siano abbiano Note too that  dire  has an irregular, truncated  tu  form:  di. The same goes for  andare, dare, fare,  and  stare,  but with these four, a regular  tu  form is also possible:  va/vai, da/dai, fa/fai, sta/stai.