par-LA-tay ee-tahl-YA-no

Whether by chance or design, many of the U.S. troops who barged into Sicily could speak Italian. For the benefit of those who could not, the Army was ready with a neat paper handbook and guide to the language, not designed to offer a complete course in Italian, but to enable any soldier to ask ordinary questions, order a meal (and pay for it), read street and highway signs, ask directions.

Where facilities permit, the book can be studied in conjunction with language records; otherwise the troops must rely for pronunciation on the English phonetics which are given for each Italian word. These phonetics provide a reasonable approximation of Italian pronunciation, but many a U.S. soldier will shy like a startled colt at learning that to ask "When does the movie start?" he must say: "ah KAY Ora ko-MEEN-cha eel FEELM?" Or that the homely, familiar phrase "main street" turns out to be "STRAda preen-chee-PA-lay."

Missing from the U.S. book is anything resembling the grim phrases included by the ever-efficient Germans in the language guides prepared for their troops during the overrunning of Europe. Example from the German handbook prepared for a possible invasion of England: "Tell the truth or you will be killed."

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