I'm not intending the general application of "a punto" but I think in the following phrase it is sort of redundant, isn't it?
Ci volle un decennio perché riuscissero a portarla a punto in una versione che fosse più gradevole e meno “medicinale”.
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2The “translatable into English” part is off topic. You should restrict your question to the meaning itself of the expression portarla a punto. As a native Italian, it sounds unusual to me (a regional expression?); I'd say either metterla a punto (if that's the meaning) or an equivalent phrase.– DaGJan 14, 2020 at 8:40
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1Where does this sentence come from?– Charo ♦Jan 14, 2020 at 8:54
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Looking at Grande dizionario della lingua italiana, which maybe is the most complete dictionary of Italian language, the expression "portare a punto" doesn't appear. Searching with Google one finds some occurrences, but not many. So, as @DaG has said, it may be a (regional?) variant of "mettere a punto" (at least it's what seems to me reading some of the examples found with Google).– Charo ♦Jan 14, 2020 at 11:15
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I think it's a slight variation of the already quoted expression mettere a punto. The expression portarla (bring it) instead of metterla (set it/get it) implies the process of getting it to the final state a punto (on point/to spec). I don't think it's a regionalism, just a way to intensify the idea that it wasn't in that state and they had to bring it there. It's a different point of view. If you set it, you start from the state it is, and go forward. If you bring it, you get it from the state it was, and get to the state it is now.– TommySimoJan 14, 2020 at 12:58
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@DaG please edit the question in the way you would prefer , I welcome it– FabioSpaghettiJan 14, 2020 at 21:07
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1 Answer
As an Italian native speaker this phrase sounds a little awkward to me because I would have written:
...perché riuscissero a metterla a punto in una versione...
In the other hand it clearly means something like "optimise it" up to a level that it could be safely and efficiently used for the task it is meant to. In English I would say "fine tuning it" but I'm not an English native speaker.
So in this sense I don't feel the expression is redundant. It's just awkward based on my use of Italian as a native speaker.
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2Benvenuto! Good answer; it would be even better with a reference from a dictionary for "mettere a punto", for instance item 10d of the definition of
puntoon Treccani. Jan 15, 2020 at 12:48