a trifle
English
Adverb
- A little, slightly.
- Synonyms: a bit; see also Thesaurus:slightly
- Could you lend me some money? I'm a trifle short of what I need to pay the rent.
- 1871–1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter 23, in Middlemarch […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book III:
- He contemplated the large well-proportioned letters and final flourish, with his head a trifle on one side for an instant […]
- 1916, James Branch Cabell, The Certain Hour[1]:
- " […] The years slip away fugacious, and Time that brings forth her children only to devour them grins most hellishly, for Time changes all things and cultivates even in herself an appreciation of irony,—and, therefore, why shouldn't I have changed a trifle? You wouldn't have me put on exhibition as a lusus naturae?"
- 1928, Lawrence R. Bourne, chapter 17, in Well Tackled![2]:
- Commander Birch was a trifle uneasy when he found there was more than a popple on the sea; it was, in fact, distinctly choppy. Strictly speaking, he ought to have been following up the picket–boat, but he was satisfied that the circumstances were sufficiently urgent for him to take risks.
- 1957, Nevil Shute [pseudonym; Nevil Shute Norway], On the Beach[3], London: William Heinemann:
- He stared at the chart. “Maybe we’ll move away towards the west a trifle, and come down on Fiji from the north.”
- 1980, Mark Gane, “Echo Beach”, performed by Martha and the Muffins:
- I know it's out of fashion / And a trifle uncool / But I can't help it / I'm a romantic fool
- 2006, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Wizard of the Crow, New York: Knopf Doubleday, Book 3, p. 411,[4]
- “Let’s get on with it,” Sikiokuu replied, a trifle impatiently.
Translations
slightly
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