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Verb for 'luck'

English Language & Usage Asked on January 22, 2021

If I got good grades with little study and preparation and no innately superior intellect, I would want to say that "I lucked through my exams".

However luck is not a verb. What can I say instead?

Edit:

This post has surprisingly spawned an interesting discussion about whether ‘luck’ is a verb or not? If it’s not strictly a verb – but the context in which it is being passed off as a verb is clear and flows harmoniously with the rest of the sentence – whether that legitimised its use?
Does anyone have any resources for this kind of topic?

5 Answers

I fluked my exams.**

fluke VERB [WITH OBJECT] Achieve (something) by luck rather than skill.

‘I played very loose in contrast to the rest of the night's play and got ahead quite quickly thanks to fluking four of a kind early on.’ https://www.lexico.com/definition/fluke


** Not to be confused with "flunk"!

Correct answer by chasly - supports Monica on January 22, 2021

Maybe you could use "lucked out" meaning

to be very lucky

[Cambridge English Dictionary]


It's considered a "phrasal verb with luck verb".

Might work for you.

Answered by William Theisen on January 22, 2021

Actually, "I lucked through my exams" is exactly how you would say it, at least according to The Free Dictionary, Vocabulary.com and my own personal experience.

Answered by No Name on January 22, 2021

"I really won the lottery when I got through those exams." [1]

[1] Note: in this case, "really" is just used for emphasis, and not actually meaning that a person really did win a lottery.

"I pulled off a miracle when I got through those exams."

"I was fortunate through those exams."

If you were just a lucky guesser, "I guessed my way through those exams."

There is also the concept of verbing a noun. (Interestingly, the word "verb" refers to a type of word, which is a noun, so the word "verb" is a noun, so the phrase "verbing a noun" is an example of verbing a noun.) If you can think of any familiar examples, whether historical and global or even recent and local, of a lucky person or event, you could use a word that refers to a lucky person or event. For example, "I Stevened my way through those exams last week" might not be readily understood in general, but if the conversation was just discussing how Steven spectacularly pulled off a streak of luck in four different ways over the past few days, then associating Steven's name with the word "luck" could be understood to anyone familiar with the context.

Answered by TOOGAM on January 22, 2021

I got lucky with my exams (I see this was also noted by @mjf in comments above). (From Merriam-Webster, "to have good luck : to succeed because of good luck" (note the close association with sex, as noted in previous comments: "get lucky" also means "to succeed in finding or getting someone to agree to have sex with one" — although I don't think there's any danger of confusion/misinterpretation in this context).

(As a phrasal verb, this answer arguably this does not satisfy the [single-word-request] tag, but the original example, "lucked through", is also a phrasal verb ... as are many of the other answers here ... "lucked up", "lucked out", not to mention "won the lottery". Of the current answers, only "fluked" [which is not common in my experience in AmE!] is a single word ...)

Answered by Ben Bolker on January 22, 2021

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