Suýt (Adv)

Situations

S1: A glass rolled to the edge of the table. Nam jumped to grab it and it didn't fall. Nam said:

May quá! Cái ly suýt vỡ.
(How lucky! The glass almost broke.)

In this situation, the possibility of the glass breaking was high.

S2: Lan liked a director who proposed to her, but she refused. Later, his company went bankrupt. She told Hoa:

Công ty của ông Toàn phá sản rồi. May quá! Em đã suýt lấy ông ta.
(Mr. Toàn's company went bankrupt. How lucky! I almost married him.)

Marriage was possible and would have been bad in hindsight, but it didn't happen.

Definition

Suýt, as an adverb, expresses a negative action or state that had the possibility of happening but ultimately did not.

  • suýt and sắp: Suýt expresses a negative possibility that didn't happen. Sắp expresses a possibility of something happening just after a certain point in time. Cf. sắp (p. 339).

  • suýt and toan: Toan expresses intending to do something right away but failing to do it. Suýt expresses something about to happen that (happily) does not happen.

[1] Tôi suýt / toan đánh nó.
    (I almost hit him / I intended to hit him.)
[2] Nó suýt / *toan khóc.
    (He almost cried.)
[3] Tôi suýt / *toan bị tai nạn.
    (I almost had an accident.)

Cf. toan (p. 375).

Combinations

  • suýt nữa / suýt chút nữa: These clusters have similar meanings to suýt.
Sáng nay, suýt nữa / suýt chút nữa tôi bị tai nạn.
(I was almost in an accident this morning.)