Skip to content

ispirare

inspire

verb ees-pee-RAH-reh Less Common

Origin: from Latin 'inspirare', to breathe into

Usage Note

Ispirare means to inspire, and the reflexive ispirarsi a means 'to be inspired by', as in il film si ispira a una storia vera. Note the initial 'i', not 'in', a regular Italian spelling shift before 's' plus consonant. Colloquially non mi ispira means 'it doesn't appeal to me'.

Examples

"La natura ispira molti artisti."

Natural Translation

Nature inspires many artists.

Literal Translation

The nature inspires many artists.

Free starter pack

Building your Italian vocabulary?

Get the 100 most common Italian words as a free PDF — one email, no spam.

Explore Italian by topic