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Re: The cost of time

From:jogloran <exponent@...>
Date:Tuesday, February 12, 2002, 5:47
Grrrrr... I replied to this thread about how Italian deals with it
before but it seems to not have been sent.

In case it hasn't, this is how it works. There are two verbs (volerci
and metterci) that are used to describe the concept of how much time
is required or spent to do something.

One (metterci) is used when the subject is known (eg in the sentence
The author took 3 years to write the book "Il scrittore ci ha messo
tre anni per scrivere il libro"), whereas the other (volerci) is used
otherwise (eg Three years were required to write the book "Ci sono
voluti tre anni per scrivere il libro").

Imperative