Just one of a
myriad wonderful things
I learned from
Umberto Eco's
novel
Foucault's Pendulum.
But sometimes Belbo, when he became really
angry, lost his composure. Since loss of
composure was the one thing he could not
tolerate in others, his own was wholly internal
- and regional. He would purse his lips,
raise his eyes, then look down, tilt his head
to the left, and say in a soft voice:
"Ma gavte la nata." For anyone who didn't
know that Piedmontese expression,
he would occasionally explain: "Ma gavte la
nata. Take out the cork." You say it to
one who is full of himself, the idea being that
what causes him to swell and strut is the
pressure of a cork stuck in his behind.
Remove it, and phsssssh, he returns to
the human condition.
I'd love if a native Italian speaker could
tell me how much dialect ma gavte la nata
is vs. pure Italian.