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Italian word of the day: ‘Tormentone’

This one's bound to get stuck in your head.

Published: 13 February 2019 18:35 CET

Italian word of the day: 'Tormentone'

Photo: DepositPhotos

With the winners of the Sanremo Music Festival still ringing in people's ears, it seems like a good time to turn the spotlight on the word tormentone.

READ ALSO: Everything you need to know about Sanremo, Italy's answer to Eurovision

If it sounds like a form of torture, well, it's not far off. The term comes from the verb tormentare ('to torment, pester, nag at'), combined with the suffix ~one that denotes large size. You can translate un tormentone literally as 'a big torment'.

What's that got to do with Sanremo? It's not a judgement on the entries' melodic qualities (or lack thereof): a tormentone is what you call a song that you hear over and over again.

Soldi di Mahmood è il tormentone di Sanremo.
Soldi by Mahmood is the hit of Sanremo.

Nera e Da zero a cento erano i tormentoni dell'estate 2018.
Nera and Da zero a cento were the big hits of summer 2018.

It's sometimes translated as 'earworm', the slightly too literal name for a song that gets stuck in your head, but a tormentone isn't necessarily irritatingly catchy. You just hear it over, and over, and over again. And then another few times more.

The term isn't just for songs: it also applies to anything that's repeated incessantly, for instance a comedian's signature punch line…

Il comico diceva il suo tormentone in ogni occasione possibile.
The comedian said his catchphrase at every possible opportunity.

… or a topic that keeps coming up.

Il matrimonio reale è il tormentone del momento.
The royal wedding is the buzz of the moment.

In fact, you can use it for anything or anyone that you're sick of the sound of.

Questo continuo passaggio di auto è un tormentone.
This continual passing of cars is a real nuisance.

Ma che tormentone questo signore!
What a pain this man is!

Do you have a favourite Italian word, phrase or expression you'd like us to feature? If so, please email our editor Jessica Phelan with your suggestion.

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Italian word of the day: 'Bocciare'

If you open your Italian test paper to see the word bocciato sprawled across the front in big red lettering, you’d be right in assuming it’s not good news.

Bocciare in Italian means to flunk, fail or to hold back.

Se non supero questo esame mi bocceranno.
If I don’t pass this exam they’re going to fail me.

Se continua a saltare le lezioni, verrà bocciata.
If she continues skipping classes, she’s going to fail out.

And bocciatura is the practice of holding a student who’s failed their end-of-year exams back a year.

Marco è stato bocciato mentre Alessia è stata promossa.
Marco was held back while Alessia moved on to the next grade.

Bocciato Sono Stato Bocciato Esame Compito Piangere Triste Tristezza Mr Bean GIF - Failed I Failed Sadness GIFs

Bocciare has other applications, however, outside the classroom. It can also more broadly mean to reject:

Era solo uno dei tanti candidati che sono stati bocciati.
He was just one of a large pool of candidates that were rejected.

And you’ll often see the word appear in headlines about politics, where it usually refers to vetoing a proposal or bill.

I sindacati hanno bocciato la proposta del governo.
Labour unions rejected the government’s proposal.

Il ddl è stato bocciato dalla Camera dei Deputati.
The bill was defeated in the lower house.

The verb has its origins in sport: bocciare originally meant to hit one ball with another in the popular Italian pastime of bocce, or boules.

There’s been some debate as to whether bocciare can be used in the active voice by the person who failed or was rejected, as in the English ‘I failed the exam’, or whether it’s only something that can happen to you (‘I was failed/they failed me’).

L’Accademia della Crusca, Italy’s preeminent linguistic authority, has weighed in on this and determined that it would amount to a semantic ‘absurdity’ in Italian for the victim of a failure to be the author of their own failing (to fail or reject themselves, so to speak).

So while you might hear someone use a phrase like Claudio ha bocciato l’esame in a colloquial context, it’s not technically considered good Italian – at least not for now.

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