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How to Have Hindsight in Italian

If you want to talk about hindsight in Italian, you can't really use your intuition.

BANNER PLACEHOLDER

English uses the verb "to see," "to look back." Italian uses the noun senno (wisdom, good judgment, common sense) a not-so-common word outside of expressions such as the present one. It also uses poi, which as an adverb means "then" or "after" and as a noun means "the future," or "the hereafter." So we're talking about wisdom after the fact. 

 

Consider this dialog between Dante and Eva from a recent episode of La Ladra.

 

Ma ragiona. Che cosa potevo fare, eh?

But just think. What could I have done, huh?

Sceglierti meglio la fidanzata.

Choose a better girlfriend.

È facile parlare col senno del poi, ma io non avevo...

It's easy to speak [judge] with hindsight, but I hadn't...

Captions 22-25, La Ladra - Ep. 3 - L'oro dello squalo - Part 10

 Play Caption

 

There's a proverb:

Del senno di poi son piene le fosse 
Graves are full of hindsight.
Hindsight has 20/20 vision.

Note that the Italian expression uses the preposition con (with) plus the article il (the): col = con ilCol senno di/del poi (with the wisdom of what happens afterward). In English, we usually say "in retrospect," and "in hindsight," or "with [the benefit of] hindsight."

BANNER PLACEHOLDER

Col senno del poi is an expression we hear often in Italian, but it's just quirky enough that it's hard to guess its intuitively. Senno is a noun we rarely hear. That's why this lesson happened. Now you know!

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