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Often, you see something like

Alas, I couldn't afford it.

But isn't it possible to use it all by itself?

I couldn't afford it. Alas!

What about in combination with "however", as in

However, alas, I couldn't afford it.

If these last two situations don't work, are there any alternatives to "alas" that would work instead?

EnglishWacko
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  • It is not an interjection I ever use, but if I did then all four of your examples look fine. – Henry Aug 19 '12 at 18:09
  • Hello EnglishWacko! ... the fact that 'alas' cannot be used by itself is a curiosly persistent notion! The source of this stricture was one Leonard Michaels, an nineteenth-century grammarian, whose 'The Growth of Language' enjoyed a long influential life both in his native England and abroad! – Elberich Schneider Aug 19 '12 at 19:06
  • @XavierVidalHernández: Please provide a link to his work. (I haven't heard of him, and would be interested to learn more about how his influential work perpetuated the myth that 'alas' cannot be used alone.) – J.R. Aug 19 '12 at 22:17
  • @J.R. ... 'The Growth of Language' is a rare book almost 100 years old that I found in the vault of this library: The Book Center, e-mail: tbc95361@yahoo.com, P.O. Box, Oakdale, CA, U.S.A., 95361-1387. I suggest you to send they an e-mail! – Elberich Schneider Aug 19 '12 at 23:01
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    @XavierVidalHernández: After that great introduction to The Growth of Language I expected you to go on to quote something about what Leonard Michaels said about 'alas'. How 'bout it? – Jim Aug 19 '12 at 23:32
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    I am curious to know how such an influential book could be so rare or unknown, to the extent that the Internet has no record of either the book or the author. (There is a Leonard Michaels, but he was a 20th century American novelist). Also, I should note that The Book Center appears to not be a library, but a bookstore instead. – waiwai933 Aug 19 '12 at 23:39
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    I'm confused. The "20th century American novelist" called Leonard Michaels (professor emeritus of English at the University of California) co-authored The State of the Language. I can't find anything about "The Growth* of Language"* – FumbleFingers Aug 20 '12 at 03:02
  • I think the third sentence would be better as "Alas, however, I couldn't afford it", but I don't think your version is a problem. –  Aug 22 '12 at 06:10

1 Answers1

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Yes, alas can be used as an interjection. Your example is fine:

I couldn't afford it. Alas!

And, yes, it can be used with "however." So your second sentence is also fine:

However, alas, I couldn't afford it.

Alas is an old-fashioned word that is rarely used in informal conversation or writing anymore. You might instead say something like, "However, I'm sad to say, I couldn't afford it."

JLG
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    For reasons I can't put my finger on, However, alas,... sounds decidedly "unnatural" to me. Apparently others don't use it either. I know that's partly because "alas" isn't so common anyway, but at least people do actually write "However, sadly" – FumbleFingers Aug 20 '12 at 02:52
  • @FumbleFingers You’re absolutely right. Can you think of a classwise synonym of either of those to swap in so we can try to figure out rule might be applying? – tchrist Aug 20 '12 at 04:15
  • @tchrist: never? truly? – Mechanical snail Aug 20 '12 at 05:13
  • @tchrist: I think the difference is that "sadly" is acting somewhat metalinguistically, as, e.g., "unfortunately", "surprisingly", conveying how the speaker feels about what they are saying (e.g., sad that the fact they are stating is true), though they needn't be experiencing that feeling esp. strongly at the moment. In contrast, "alas" acts more as an expression of feeling, as "ouch", "hooray". It isn't tied to the discourse in the same way, though there might be a causal connection. E.g., people often explain the reason for their expressed feeling (Ouch! I just bit my tongue). [cont...] – Rachel Aug 23 '12 at 06:01
  • It might sound unnatural to express a feeling in the middle of a sentence, especially one explaining the reason for the feeling. It might also sound odd because the word is interpeted as a whole sentence and so is more disruptive in the middle of another. Compare "My last boyfriend--Ah!--broke my heart." and "Ah! My last boyfriend broke my heart. (Ah!)". So perhaps "alas" is always taken as an interjection. – Rachel Aug 23 '12 at 06:04