ALAS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does alas mean? 

• ALAS (adverb)
  The adverb ALAS has 1 sense:

1. by bad luck

  Familiarity information: ALAS used as an adverb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• ALAS (adverb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

By bad luck

Synonyms:

alas; regrettably; unfortunately; unluckily

Context example:

alas, I cannot stay

 Context examples 

Alas! I regret that I am taken from you; and, happy and beloved as I have been, is it not hard to quit you all?

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Alas! sighed she, if any of my father’s court should pass by and see me standing in the market, how they will laugh at me!

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Alas, life had other plans for you.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

It was, alas, only too easy to do.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But now, alas, how welcome would have been the feel of their presence, the frou-frou and swish-swish of their skirts which I had so cordially detested!

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

Harrow and alas! but they were worse than the others.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Alas! it all went to confirm me in my first horrible suspicion, and to turn it into a certainty.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Second, because, as my narrative will make, alas! too evident, my discoveries were incomplete.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

I woke Madam Mina, and again tried to hypnotise her; but alas! unavailing till too late.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

Alas! yes: the more's the pity!

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)