Library / English Dictionary

TRY FOR

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Make an attempt at achieving something

Example:

She tried for the Olympics

Synonyms:

go for; try for

Classified under:

Verbs of fighting, athletic activities

Hypernyms (to "try for" is one way to...):

compete; contend; vie (compete for something; engage in a contest; measure oneself against others)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Credits

 Context examples: 

I shall try for it with a zeal!

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

By degrees the girls came to spend the chief of the morning upstairs, at first only in working and talking, but after a few days, the remembrance of the said books grew so potent and stimulative that Fanny found it impossible not to try for books again.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Here the lecture began, but Jo heard very little of it, for while Professor Sands was prosing away about Belzoni, Cheops, scarabei, and hieroglyphics, she was covertly taking down the address of the paper, and boldly resolving to try for the hundred-dollar prize offered in its columns for a sensational story.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Then a month later, you hear from the seller that the people who won the bid were having problems getting a mortgage approved, and you get a second chance to try for your dream apartment again.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

He only wanted to aggrandise and enrich himself; and if Miss Woodhouse of Hartfield, the heiress of thirty thousand pounds, were not quite so easily obtained as he had fancied, he would soon try for Miss Somebody else with twenty, or with ten.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)