words fail (someone)
- idiom
:
las palabras no le llegan
- Sometimes words fail me when I try to express how much I appreciate your help.
Examples
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At the sight of the surprise party, words failed him and he stood in stunned silence.
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When she saw the devastation left by the storm, words failed her.
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When I saw the surprise party, words failed me!
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After hearing the news, words failed him.
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At the sight of the surprise party, words failed him and he stood in stunned silence.
-
When she saw the devastation left by the storm, words failed her.
-
Sometimes words fail me when I try to express how much I appreciate your help.
Synonyms
61
3.1
Unable to speak for a short time because you feel very surprised or shocked
28
4.2
Not knowing what to do or say
9
6.7
Very surprised and unable to speak
7
4.6
Very surprised and unable to speak
5
6.5
So shocked that you cannot speak
Not able to find words because of strong feeling
Confused and not sure what to do
Antonyms
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning can be inferred by interpreting 'fail' as 'be insufficient' so that 'words fail (someone)' means words are inadequate to express the speaker's feelings; however, this uses a less literal sense of 'fail' and an atypical subject/object alignment (words as the thing that 'fails' a person), which may not be fully transparent to a B1 learner without contextual support. Cross-linguistically similar constructions exist (e.g. 'me faltan las palabras'), so the phrase is partially predictable but still somewhat idiomatic.
Etymology
The expression words fail (someone) gives a simple image: a person's words 'fail' and stop working, as if a tool had broken. That's why it means 'cannot find anything to say' when someone is very shocked or moved.